Since You Went Away
by i-must-go-first
Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend. By UbiquitousMixie and i-must-go-first.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Since You Went Away  
Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie  
Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, _The Closer_  
Rating: PG (Overall M)  
Chapter Word Count: 11,596  
Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.  
Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.  
Authors' Note: This story has been in the works for the past nine months and we're really, really excited to share it with the fandom. It's been a labor of love for us. Comments and feedback would be greatly appreciated.

**Chapter One: To Have and Have Not**

Brenda Leigh heaped a generous spoonful of butter into the pot of mashed potatoes and proceeded to mix it into the fluffy white mixture, pausing to dip a finger in for a taste. She smacked her lips appreciatively and, checking again to make sure the burner was turned off (_not_ a mistake she was eager to repeat after an angry phone call from her landlord), heaved herself onto the counter and stuck in her spoon.

The sound of her heels thudding against the cabinet and the scrape of her spoon against the pot punctuated the silence, reminding Brenda that she was completely, gloriously alone. She could sit unapologetically on the counter in her underwear, perched beside a dirty bowl that had been there for a day or two and the can of butter spray that she'd forgotten to put away when she made brownies the week before. She could eat as much of the mashed potatoes as she wanted without having to worry about saving another portion and eat directly from the bowl without being chastised. She could hum off-key without being compared to a drowning cat. She could do what she wanted however she wanted because she was Brenda Leigh Johnson: a free woman.

Marriage hadn't exactly been a prison sentence, but there had been something incredibly freeing about the moment when she and Fritz had agreed that it simply wasn't working anymore. It had been two months since she moved out and it was still a novelty to her.

The vibrating of her cell phone was a welcome distraction to the train of thought that she had been ardently avoiding, and so it was with little hesitation that she glanced at the screen and hit the button to accept the call. "Hello, Mama."

"Oh my goodness, you actually answered the phone!" Willie Rae exclaimed, the twang of her accent warming Brenda like her favorite childhood blanket. "What's wrong?"

"What? Nothin's wrong."

"It's not nice to lie to your mama, Brenda Leigh."

"I'm not lyin'! I'm just home early is all…"

"You get home a lot earlier now that you're livin' on your own," Willie Rae observed.

Brenda sighed and filled her mouth with potatoes to avoid being baited by her mother. When her mother's steady breath blew against the phone, the blonde rolled her eyes and swallowed. "I'm sure that's just a coincidence. I work just as much as I've always worked."

"How is Fritz doin'?"

This time, Brenda dumped her spoon in the pot and scooted off the edge of the counter. When her bare feet hit the linoleum, she padded over to the open bottle of Merlot and poured herself a glass. "I don't know. We don't exactly check in with each other every day."

Willie Rae hummed disapprovingly. "I heard he's lookin' to transfer back east."

"Where'd you hear—Mama, are you talkin' to Fritzi?" She took a large gulp of wine and cocked her hip against the counter.

"He called to wish your father a happy birthday last week," her mother explained. "He sounds good, Brenda Leigh. Much better than you do."

"What're you talkin' about? I sound just fine."

"Mmmhmm…I'll just bet that you haven't even finished unpackin'."

Brenda glanced into the living room, eyeing the precarious pyramid of boxes. "Yes, I have."

"You can fool a fool, Brenda Leigh, but you can't fool me."

Retrieving the pot of potatoes, she strolled into the next room and paused. The deputy chief looked around the barren living area and poked at the rapidly cooling mashed potatoes, irritated by the pang of guilt she felt. She swallowed another mouthful of Merlot for good measure. For heaven's sake, if she was content to live out of boxes and sit on her IKEA futon to watch TV, what should it matter to anybody else? She could do exactly as she pleased. Wasn't that the chief benefit of being newly single?

Still, she heard herself say, "It's not that bad, Mama. I've just been busy, is all."

"So you say, but you're home now," Willie Rae pointed out.

Confronted with this irrefutable logic, Brenda remained silent. She'd just realized that her voice echoed off the naked walls and wooden floors when she spoke, which must have been what had tipped her mother off to her sad lack of interior decorating skills in the first place - unless, of course, it was just that the elder Johnson woman knew her daughter a bit better than Brenda cared to admit.

Once she realized she wasn't going to receive a verbal response, Willie Rae sighed. "I never icould/i get you to put your toys away without a battle," she recalled. "Honey, why don't you ask some of your nice friends to come and help you? That's what friends are for, after all. And afterwards, you can make them - that is, _take them out_ for dinner as a thank-you."

Brenda rolled her eyes. "I can't really see Lieutenant Provenza signin' up for that, Mama. Or Detective Sanchez. Or -"

"All right, maybe not them. I bet your new apartment could use a feminine touch anyway."

Now Brenda frowned. "I have a feminine touch," she protested, and it was her mother's turn to remain silent. Well,_ fine_, the chief considered, brooding. She hardly saw how the possession of two X chromosomes could be beneficial when it came to unpacking boxes and putting books on a shelf.

She was suddenly assaulted by a memory of sitting on the hideous gold carpet of her first post-college apartment, moaning about the faithlessness of some guy whose name she couldn't quite remember - Steve, maybe? No, she'd still been at Georgetown when she'd gone out with him - and sharing tears, laughter, and a large pepperoni pizza with her best friend, Christine. Maybe the unpacking wasn't really the point.

Christine and Brenda Leigh had lost touch long ago, their lives drifting in different directions. When Brenda had last received a Christmas card from her old friend, featuring a family photo of Christine with her blonde husband and their equally blonde two (or was it three?) children, Christine had mentioned that she owned an insurance agency in Baltimore. Brenda was fairly certain the two of them had nothing in common now but their memories, so it wasn't Christine she suddenly missed, but rather the idea of that sort of female companionship.

Brenda sighed into her cell phone. "I don't have any female friends," she admitted. "All my friends are people I work with; you know that."

"What about Sharon?"

Brenda Leigh choked on a mouthful of mashed potatoes as she imagined Captain Sharon Raydor standing in the middle of this room, distastefully flicking motes of dust from the sleeve of her designer blazer and checking items off in her ever-present notebook as she fastidiously oversaw the arrangement of whatever the heck it was that Brenda had crammed into all these boxes in the first place. The incongruous vision was almost enough to make the deputy chief laugh out loud.

_Almost._

Willie Rae persisted. "You_ did_ tell your father and me that you were friends."

Brenda shuddered at the challenging tone of her mother's voice, much in the way she had when she was a child and had been caught trying to pass the blame of the broken VCR to Clay Jr. "Uh, we are. But Sharon's got her own thing goin' on. She doesn't have time to play house with me." Not that she knew what Sharon Raydor did when she was off the clock; Brenda had always assumed that the captain was always working - that, or she simply crawled back into her pod.

What_ did_ Sharon do with her free time?

"Now you're just makin' excuses. If you won't get your behind in gear, maybe I should make a trip out and lend a hand."

It wasn't a_ threat_, exactly, but Brenda positively cringed at the mental image of her apartment done over in mismatched, hideous floral prints. She washed away the thought with a sip of her wine. No-this apartment was her home, the first since Atlanta that she could decorate as she pleased. She _would_ do it...even if it meant having to do it alone.

Which she was completely fine with.

"I'm gonna do it. Really, Mama. I'll send pictures."

Willie Rae chuckled, and the chief could picture her standing in her vast Georgia kitchen, pursing her lips and raising her eyebrow. "Can you honestly tell me you know where your camera is?"

"Course I do!" Brenda yelped defensively. "I know exactly where it is." She glanced over at a stack of boxes that served as the place where she dumped her mail. One of the boxes was labelled "electronic stuff" - the camera _had_ to be in there.

The old woman gave a helpless sigh. "I'm worried about you, sweetheart."

There it was: the real reason for her mother's phone call. Brenda frowned and used her spoon to create a mountain of mashed potatoes in the pot, which she then caved in. "I'm doin' just fine. Really. Things are great."

"Are you tryin' to convince me or you?"

Brenda rolled her eyes. "Mama."

"All right, all right..."

Feeling suddenly a little edgy, Brenda set down the pot. "Listen, I'm gettin' another call. It's probably work," she lied, twirling the stem of her wine glass in her fingers. "I'll call you in a few days, okay? Tell daddy I love him."

"Try not to work too hard! And please try to remember what I said, Brenda Leigh. A grown woman livin' on her own needs a girlfriend."

"All right. Love you! Bye now." Brenda quickly ended the call before Willie Rae could chime in again and tossed her phone on the other end of the futon. She exhaled a heavy breath, feeling as though she had just evaded her own interrogative techniques.

Honestly, she wasn't a little girl anymore. She didn't need a man or her parents or anyone else to take care of her. She was doing perfectly fine on her own.

Wasn't she?

Swirling the pinot noir in her stemless wine glass with one hand, Sharon wielded a spatula with the other, using it to move the handful of shallots around the frying pan so they'd gradually turn an even golden color rather than browning. Under her breath she vaguely hummed some snatch of a melody, something she must've heard on the radio today on a station that had actually played a song amid the interminable stream of commercials. It wasn't so much that Sharon felt like humming as it was that she remembered she had once hummed contentedly in moments like this, alone with her thoughts and the fragrant smells of a good meal in the cozy warmth of her kitchen.

When her cell phone began to ring she welcomed the distraction.

"Ooh, answering on the third ring - slow night at the cop shop?"

"I am at home, for your information."

"Everybody in the LAPD decided to play nicely today?"

"Oh, yes, sweetheart. We all traded our glocks in for wreaths of flowers and sang 'Kumbaya,' and as a result Mommy is home early."

"I find that hard to believe."

"I'm even cooking."

"Harder to believe."

"Hah-hah. Was there something?"

"What, I can't just call to check in on my beloved Aged P? Make sure you haven't fallen and found yourself unable to get up?"

"Line. Crossed."

"You're so easy, Mom. You remain a stone fox, as ever."

Sharon sipped her wine. "That's more like it, baby."

"Wanna meet me for dinner tomorrow night? We could go to that place with the crazy hot salsa."

"Tomorrow is Friday."

"_And_ you've got a mind like a steel trap. You're just the complete package."

"I mean, shouldn't you have something more exciting to do on a Friday night than go to dinner with your mother?"

"Oh, let me check my calendar. Let's see: _no_."

"You can't just sit home and mope the whole time Kai is in Korea, Daniel. He's going to be there for nine months. Not only is it a waste of time that does no one any favors, but it makes you a middlebrow cliche."

"I'm not moping; I'm inviting my mother to dinner."

"You're inviting me to_ pay_ for dinner."

"Jesus, Mom, I can afford _tacos_, okay? Is that a yes?"

Sharon's shallots were browning. She quickly shoved at them with the spatula and added the mixture of minced chicken and basil with Thai chilis that had been chilling in her refrigerator.

"We all know you don't have a hot date," Daniel added.

The captain scowled and placed her wine on the counter so she had a free hand to flip her long hair over her shoulder. "Pot, kettle," she pointed out.

"Minor difference: I have a boyfriend. When was the last time you even went out?"

"This may be hard for you to grasp at the advanced age of twenty-four, honey, but by my stage of life, the thrill of dating has palled. I am perfectly fine the way I am. I enjoy being single."

"I know, Mom." There was a crinkling sound; Sharon pictured her son sprawled on his sofa, the fabric of which was now an indeterminate color that might once have been tan, and scarfing down an entire bag of barbecue potato chips. Oh, to be that young.

Sharon took another sip of her wine and crinkled her nose as she thought of herself at twenty-four. Scratch that. No way would she want to be that young again. She'd take the chips, though, and cheerfully give up the mild arthritis in her knees in return.

"But are you sure you want to be..._ so_ single?"

She snorted. Dating advice from her son; Christ, she was the cliche, not Danny.

"You and Dad have been divorced for nearly fifteen years," he continued. "You used to go out, at least, but when have you had a real relationship?"

"My dinner is ready, Daniel."

"There's not anybody at work? I mean, I've seen the statistics. All those men..."

"Danny," Sharon said sharply, aware that she didn't need to say anything else.

"You could try the internet. Some of those sites are really reputa-"

"Good _night_, son."

"I'll see you tomorrow, Mom."

Sharon rolled her eyes heavenward and disconnected the call, placing the phone down on the countertop. She swirled the wine around her glass and inhaled its earthy, heady fragrance before savoring another small sip, allowing herself the brief moment to simply enjoy the quiet. There weren't many nights like this where she could soak in the solitude and relax, so she made a point to enjoy them, even if the motions were somewhat habitually forced rather than natural.

Daniel's persistence about her love life wasn't completely for nought; the idea of companionship was something she wouldn't necessarily decline if given an enticing enough offer, but there was something soothing about these peaceful evenings at home. She'd be remiss to give them up for the chaos of dating or, if hell were to suddenly experience an unexpected cold front, an actual relationship.

An actual relationship, complete with dinner-and-a-movie dates and pet names and sex and morning breath and public displays of affection-the very idea of it was nearly laughable. Sharon hardly considered herself washed up or itoo old/i for that sort of thing, but she could not deny the possibility that she had become a little too settled in the routine of her life to crave that sort of companionable spontaneity.

It occurred to her, as she heaped the single serving of chicken and rice onto her red dinner plate, that Daniel, at his woefully young age, could not fully appreciate the concept of a solitary lifestyle. She had done her time with her husband and had raised two children and had, in some small way, served as the surrogate mother to her entire division. She had earned this and she was damn well going to enjoy it.

Danny, bless him, was concerned about her. Of her two children, his disposition was the most like her own. He was her male mirror image at times and, to her chagrin, self-awareness begot self-awareness, and he could read her better than almost anyone. As she turned off the stove and put the pan into the sink to soak, she made a mental note to prepare for his typical assault of overly-personal questions and helpful meddling at dinner.

Sharon collected her dinner plate and glass and seated herself at the table, pausing for a moment to listen to the silence that surrounded her. She had always enjoyed the quiet, the silence. She liked to be able to withdraw into it, wrap it around herself like a favorite sweater and snuggle deeply into it, just burying herself. That was actually one of the things she enjoyed about being in FID. Oh, her office wasn't silent, of course, but compared to the hustle and bustle of divisions like Robbery/Homicide or Vice and the barely controlled chaos of crime scenes, it might as well have been. Captain Raydor liked to close her door and be alone with her pens and papers and forms, accompanied only by the near-noiseless hum of her computer.

Silence had a certain quality when you were alone in it, a purity that was like the transparency of crystal-clear, cold spring-water; you could penetrate all the way to the depths of it without really even having to look or wonder. Sharon relished having her house to herself after having shared it for most of her adult life. In her mind she again heard the barking of Jericho, the family's long-deceased mutt, and the slamming of the back door followed by the pounding of two pairs of sneaker-clad feet as Daniel immediately trotted upstairs to begin his homework and Vivien tore through the downstairs rooms howling for a snack or her misplaced soccer cleats or the sheet music she needed to memorize.

Sharon felt her lips curl into a smile, but after only a split second the smile froze and then melted away. Her fork scraped against her plate as she heaped chicken and rice together, the sound unnervingly loud in the silent kitchen.

Maybe, she considered, looking down at the dinner she no longer particularly wanted to eat, the house was a little_ too_ silent tonight.

A few seconds later Sharon's bare feet padded across the Spanish tile, the sound following her into the living room as she arranged her plate and glass on the coffee table and pointed the remote control at the flat-screen television. It flared to life and a newscaster's stern but sonorous voice filled the living room, intoning words of environmental woe, economic catastrophe, and political upheaval.

Sharon sighed with unabashed relief. Then she spread her napkin over her lap, picked up her fork, and resumed eating her stir-fry.

Wandering aimlessly in the supermarket was not how Brenda had hoped to spend her Friday night. She'd been fully prepared to work into the weekend, but her suspect had confessed earlier than expected, giving up the names of his accomplices and leaving her with a neatly closed case once they had all been rounded up. Under normal circumstances, she'd have been undeniably pleased with her efforts but she was oddly disappointed to now have the prospect of Friday Night looming ahead of her.

Fritz had been big on having date nights every Friday, whether they went to the movies or watched documentaries while they ate takeout or made love until the early hours of the morning. It wasn't something Brenda ever particularly_ needed_, but it had been important to him and so she had made the effort as all good wives did. Toward the end of their marriage, date night had been taken over by stale conversation over leftovers and going to bed early with their backs to each other.

It was a relief to Brenda that those awkward nights were over. Fritz was no doubt spending date night with someone else who probably really_ wanted_ it (Brenda never asked if he was seeing someone new and he never volunteered the information, which meant that he probably was), and she was forced to admit that her cozy little apartment had been just a little too quiet to handle without restocking her Merlot supply.

She had originally planned on unpacking but, after opening a box and peering inside to find a mishmash of cords and a broken toaster, she decided to clean out the fridge instead. As it had turned out, there wasn't much to clean: most of the leftovers needed to be tossed, which left her with a few cans of diet soda, a bottle of ketchup, and a carton of eggs.

It wasn't her near-empty fridge that had motivated her to go grocery shopping so much as it had been her desire to be around people. She didn't necessarily want to interact with anyone. She simply, albeit begrudgingly, was forced to admit to herself that she needed to feel like she wasn't entirely alone. She needed to know that there were other perfectly normal, happy people who went shopping for groceries on a Friday night instead of stupidly buying into that ridiculous date night business.

As she maneuvered her shopping cart around the supermarket, bypassing the fresh produce in favor of the bag of dried banana chips that hung nearby, she caught a glance of the store's small corner of flowers. Brown eyes scanned the vibrant hues of orchid petals and wilting carnations, pausing momentarily on a sad, droopy little fern.

Maybe Brenda Leigh needed a fern.

As soon as the thought flickered through her mind, she rolled her eyes at herself and propelled her cart forward, away from the plants and toward the aisle that housed the toothpaste. She absently reached for something in a blue box and dumped it into the cart, wondering if it would be inappropriate to open the bag of banana chips to munch on while she shopped. She decided against it, having always judged others for doing the same thing. What if they'd forgotten their debit card and only realized it once they reached the cash register and had already downed their cola? Just to be safe, Brenda peered inside the large black purse that was nestled in the basket and made sure that her wallet was there.

She grabbed a bottle of cucumber melon Suave shampoo and idly hummed along to the song that played overhead, passing by random shoppers as she weaved her way through the aisles. She'd bypassed many of the grocery essentials, like milk and cheese and bread, and had instead loaded up on the Brenda Leigh Johnson essentials: two bottles of Merlot, three boxes of ding dongs (buy two, get one free), honey (the kind in the bear-shaped bottle, not the boring one that Fritz always used to buy), Cheetos, Special K cereal, Drain-o, and rubber gloves (for cleaning...when she cleaned).

As Brenda pondered her loot, she tried to remember what else she absolutely needed before she left. She knew she really_ should_ get the rest of her groceries, especially since she wasn't particularly in a rush to get back to her quiet little apartment. A night of unpacking and cleaning and watching Food Network wasn't entirely appealing, especially now that she was dressed and in public.

She also knew that she couldn't stay there forever, and so she decided that she would bake a cake. Yes -a triple chocolate layer cake with dark chocolate shavings. Brenda nearly licked her lips at the thought. Suddenly the night didn't seem so glum.

Steering her cart back toward the candy aisle, Brenda put a little extra spring in her step at the prospect of baking one of the very few recipes that she had successfully mastered. She was beginning to feel downright giddy -

- until she rounded the corner of the aisle and found herself nearly colliding with Sharon Raydor.

Sharon had learned the hard way never to go grocery shopping when she was hungry. Those who knew Sharon well, really knew her, were privy to a bit of information no one at the LAPD would have even suspected: impulse control was not Captain Raydor's strong suit. She had learned to be very, very good at it, but it had taken a hell of a lot of work, and she was quietly proud of the accomplishment. It wasn't natural, not innate. There had to be rules, methods, little tactics that built up an entire way of life. One of those simple little rules was for Sharon not to go grocery shopping when she was hungry unless she wanted to end up with a kitchen stocked with cheese, crackers, potato chips, hummus and frozen pizza.

Tonight she wasn't hungry, she was just pissed off.

Sharon seized a jar of popcorn, the old-fashioned kind you pop on the stove-top with salt and oil and love because it's just iso much better/i than the microwavable kind, and placed it in her basket, where it was flanked by squash, zucchini, a bag of frozen shrimp and, yes, a block of extra-sharp cheddar. Placing the basket on the floor between her moccasin-shod feet, she consulted her shopping list, crossing off the items she'd already picked up and planning the remainder of her route through the massive store. She didn't need much, really, and had intended to defer this little outing until Saturday night (although spending Saturday night at the supermarket was even sadder than spending Friday night there, and seemed to suggest that maybe Daniel actually had a valid point about her social life, which annoyed Sharon so severely that she considered tossing a tub of yogurt-covered pretzels into the basket, but she refrained). After sharing two orders of chicken verde tacos and a few beers with her son, though, she'd felt too agitated to go straight home.

Which was ridiculous. Her meddling little bastard of an offspring meant well, and she knew it. Plus he had paid for dinner. It had been a while since anyone had taken Sharon out for dinner. And the salsa was just as scorching and delicious as she had remembered.

Skim milk and light cream cheese joined the other items in her basket. Quinoa, aluminum foil, paper towels, the extra-strength anti-frizz hairspray - She checked the last four things off of her admittedly idiosyncratic list, slipped the slightly crumpled piece of paper into the pocket of the casual navy blazer she wore over the jeans and t-shirt she'd changed into after work, and set off for the checkout at a brisk clip.

As if she had no control over her feet, the captain felt herself veering toward the candy aisle - the gourmet candy aisle, to be precise. Her tongue still tingling from the habaneros that had graced her tacos, Sharon found herself craving something rich and decadent for dessert, and she was pretty sure all she had at home was hot cocoa mix. She didn't relish the thought of eating the grainy powder with a spoon.

… not that she'd ever done that before.

Generally Sharon preferred salty, savory snacks to sweet, but occasionally there was an exception, and one such exception was the _special chocolate_. That was how she thought of it, an entity so pure, dark, and sinful that it belonged in its own category. 87% pure organic cacao enfolded in a dark crimson wrapper, it would be the perfect accompaniment to Rachel Maddow's words of wisdom and the rest of that bottle of pinot she'd opened last night.

Which was a perfectly legitimate way for an interesting, attractive, highly intelligent 54-year-old woman to spend an evening, damn it.

Sharon was well known for the intensity of her focus, and she was intensely focused on that crimson wrapper - ye gods and little fishes, the last one on the shelf! - so that was probably how she failed to notice the red-sweatered blonde tornado hurtling toward her until a shopping cart collided painfully with her right hip. She spun to challenge the custodian of the cart, who was also the owner of the slender hand reaching for that last precious chocolate bar.

She felt her lips press together into a grim line as she met the startled gaze of Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson, who smiled and stammered, "Ca - Capt'n."

Sharon frowned and said the only thing she could think of: "I saw it first."

The blonde recovered from her momentary lapse of composure and pursed her lips. "Nice to see you too," she quipped, arching an eyebrow challengingly.

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Hello, _Chief_. Lovely weather we're having. Kindly let go of my chocolate bar."

"It's not _yours_. You haven't paid for it."

"Nor have you."

Why was it that whenever Brenda Leigh Johnson was concerned, Sharon felt instantly transported to the sandbox days, when Judy Lincoln would pull her hair and steal her shovel and insist that she had never really wanted to use it in the first place? Foregoing the urge to tug on those golden curls, Sharon stiffened and eyed the bar of chocolate in the chief's hand. It was still odd to see the woman without her wedding ring, but she decided she would ruminate on that later. Now, green eyes darted over the mass of items in the younger woman's shopping cart and she scowled.

"You have three boxes of ding dongs, Chief. Clearly your palate doesn't require such refined chocolate."

Brown eyes narrowed. "I'm gonna bake a cake."

Sharon was tired and irritated; she thought maybe she'd forgotten to set the DVR to record Rachel Maddow, and she'd had two Presidentes with her tacos. None of these factors improved her disposition or strengthened her self-control. She guffawed.

"A cake. You're planning to defile this chocolate by using it to make a _cake_?"

Without further deliberation, Sharon snatched the chocolate bar from Brenda's unsuspecting grasp and held it to her chest with a protective, proprietary air. The deputy chief's eyes widened.

Of all the nerve! "It's a very good cake. An _excellent_ cake. I use an Ina Garten recipe."

The captain, who was holding herself in a more loose-limbed fashion than usual, arched an eyebrow. "You bake," she clarified in a tone of flat amazement. "And it is necessary that you use this particular chocolate in order to bake this 'excellent' cake?"

Brenda cocked her head and contemplated the items in the older woman's shopping basket. Healthy stuff, mostly - like the things on the grocery list Brenda Leigh had left at home magnetized to the refrigerator. She glanced down at the essentials in her own cart, and then looked askance at the captain's basket. There were no surprises there. (Except, wait, was that extra-strength anti-frizz hairspray? Brenda's eyes slid back up to the long, sleek brown locks tumbling over Sharon's left shoulder, and she felt a flicker of smug triumph at the knowledge that the FID captain didn't just emerge fully and perfectly formed each morning from her chrysalis - or the coffin she probably slept in.) The older woman certainly wasn't buying any junk food, unless you counted popcorn, which the chief definitely didn't.

But Sharon wanted that chocolate bar.

Something odd was happening to the blonde: her annoyance was ebbing away to be replaced by mild amusement. Sharon Raydor might taunt her for her ding dong proclivities, but her craving for this chocolate was just a higher-brow version of the very same impulse. Somehow it leveled the playing field.

"No," Brenda conceded, smiling slightly, "I suppose I don't. So you just keep that one." A dimple appeared in her left cheek as she pondered her own magnanimity. Being the bigger person caused a lovely, lofty glow to spread through her; it was almost as good as eating that 87% pure-cacao dark chocolate.

Sharon watched those brown eyes narrow as they scrutinized her response. Judy Lincoln, too, had had her rare impulses of generosity. (_"Here, Sharon, you can play with the shovel if it really matters that much to you._") Judy, like Brenda Leigh, had expected Sharon to toss the hard-won prize aside, its value at last negated by the brunette's ability to possess it.

Sharon never had given back that shovel, and the chocolate did matter that much. Her lips twisted into a smirk as she tossed the crimson-wrapped treat into her basket. "Thanks, chief."

The obvious surprise on Brenda's face made the smirk turn into a bona fide grin.

Brenda matched the look with a smirk of her own. "Looks like you need it more than me."

"I don't need it. I want it. There's a difference."

The blonde had difficulty wrapping her mind around this newly acquired information. Sharon "I-must-go-first-I-must-I-must-I-must" Raydor actually _wanted_ things? In all the time that Brenda had known the older woman, everything she had asked for (or, really, _demanded_) had been from a place of necessity. Was this captain, this woman, actually capable of wanting, coveting, and craving?

Perhaps she was human after all.

"No wonder you want it so bad," Brenda replied, peeking again into the bland assortment of goods in Sharon's basket, "with all that."

"_You_ are judging_ my_ groceries?" Sharon balked, issuing a snort. "You're hardly planning a five-course meal."

"Who said anythin' about a meal?"

"Oh that's right: you're baking a cake."

"Scoff all you want. My cake's gonna be delicious."

The corner of Sharon's mouth tugged upward into a smirk. "I'm sure."

The blonde bristled at the underwhelming vote of confidence. "Why is it that you think I'm incapable of performing the simplest of tasks? I just bet I'd surprise you, given the chance."

It was impossible for Sharon to miss how defensive the blonde was becoming and, after the irritation that had been building since dinner with her son, she decided to let this one go (purely for the sake of her own nerves). "On the contrary, chief, you surprise me often."

"Good," Brenda preened. "I think." She grabbed a lesser-quality bar of dark chocolate from the shelf and tossed it into her cart.

They stood together in awkward silence, each woman looking anywhere but at the other, neither wanting to be the first to admit that they wanted to run away from the other's company. It was a refreshing change of pace for Brenda to be in a state of constant check with the stubborn woman, as opposed to Fritzi's never-ending willingness to submit to her will. Outside of the office, Sharon and Brenda were both simply women who had nothing better to do on a Friday night than raid the supermarket. Without that workplace animosity in the way, Brenda found herself actually -not _enjoying_ the random accidental interaction, but appreciating how intrigued and curious she had become.

Sharon cocked her chin, her mysterious grin softening, and the deputy chief fleetingly wondered whether the captain's thoughts might be flowing in a similar vein. "Well," the older woman drawled, "good night, chief. Enjoy your cake. Oh, and perhaps once you've finished baking it, you could also finish that incident commander statement I need before I can file my report on Officer Gloria Raymond's discharge of her service weapon." She shifted her basket to her right hand and checked her watch. "Seventy-four hours and counting."

Brenda applauded herself for waiting until the captain had turned her back to roll her eyes. Still, she couldn't help mentally reviewing the conversation she'd had the previous evening with her mother. Maybe the idea of trying to make friends with Sharon Raydor wasn't so crazy after all, even if the hyper-organized woman probably divided her leisure time up into precise fifteen-minute increments. Brenda's options were limited, and bickering with Sharon would beat the heck out of trolling for nubile females with Provenza, playing Halo with Buzz and Tao, or going to church to sing hymns with choirboy Gabriel. That chocolate bar hinted at untold possibilities.

Brenda rearranged her limbs, seeking a more comfortable position on the futon, which, admittedly, was a smidge too narrow even for her small frame, and removed her reading glasses so she could rub at her dry eyes. She glanced over at the TV and curled her lip in distaste. There was absolutely nothing interesting on unless you were into golf, which Brenda Leigh was not. She'd finally settled on a flashy Spanish-language soap opera in the vague hope of picking up a few phrases, since Julio perpetually and politely ridiculed her for her inability even to pronounce many of the city's street names correctly, but she definitely needed an interpreter - unless the guy with the mustache really had just asked for a dog, a shot of tequila, and a blue dress, which seemed unlikely. She pointed the remote at the screen, turned the TV off, and made a mental note to find and unpack her DVDs.

The clock on her cell phone informed her that it was 6:53, twelve minutes since she'd last checked. She'd just dotted her last i and crossed her last t, so she no longer had the distraction of the paperwork she'd brought home to keep herself company, but at least it was a respectable dinner time. She looked over her shoulder at the kitchen, whose surfaces were liberally sprinkled with flour and sugar, and sternly told herself she couldn't just eat cake.

But it was a delicious cake; even smug Sharon would have to admit that much.

She eyed the cake in question, which was proudly displayed on a cake plate in the middle of her table. She'd had the presence of mind to fish it out of the box labeled "kitcheny things" while the cake was in the oven, not wanting her own laziness and lackadaisical attitude about unpacking to ruin a perfectly decadent cake.

And it _was_ decadent, if the three-quarters that remained had anything to say about it.

Brenda dampened a sponge and quickly wiped off the counters, wondering if she should go ahead and start boiling a pot of water, but quickly dismissed the idea. Even she was getting sick of clam linguine. She wasn't even that hungry, though she could certainly work up an appetite in the time it took for the Chinese place near her apartment to deliver. She reached for her phone and then hesitated.

Alone on a Saturday night with Chinese takeout was about as bad as Friday night in a grocery store.

Tossing the sponge back into the sink, Brenda wiped her hands on the dish towel draped along the handle of the stove. She peered back into the living room, surmising her options, and once again caught sight of the plain manila folder.

Captain Raydor _was_ on a deadline, and an impromptu visit _would_ shake things up a little.

Brenda grinned wickedly. It would also give her a chance to show off her delicious cake.

It was surprisingly easy to find Sharon's address. By the time she'd carved out a large slice of cake, stuck it in the last clean tupperware container in the cupboard, and headed out the door, Brenda was nearly teeming with giddiness at the thought of just how ruffled Sharon would be when she showed up at her doorstep.

Sharon, as it turned out, lived only eighteen minutes away from Brenda's new apartment, fifteen minutes closer than the house she'd shared with Fritz. She wasn't sure why she was so pleased to know this, but the possibility that she might have a potential friend within a respectable distance was certainly something her mother would love.

When she parked her car in front of the captain's house, she briefly considered the idea that, while Brenda had no plans on a Saturday night, Sharon just might. She made note of the car in the driveway and the light that illuminated the captain's porch and decided that she liked her chances.

If Sharon was as much of a homebody as Brenda suspected, she may just be in business.

She rang the doorbell and held her breath.

She nearly laughed when Sharon answered the door, clad in gray yoga pants and an off-the-shoulder red sweater. "Chief?" Emerald eyes narrowed as she gave the blonde a quick once-over. "What are you doing here? I hope someone's been shot."

"I thought I'd bring by that report you wanted." Brenda made no move to reach into her purse for the file, hoping that Sharon would take the hint and invite her inside.

"On a Saturday?"

Brenda shrugged, peering over the captain's bare shoulder to sneak a peek inside the elusive woman's house. She caught hues of brown and gold and itched to see what else was inside, feeling like an impatient child with her face pressed against the outdoor window of Toys R' Us. "I know you think I don't care about paperwork and deadlines, but I do," she said virtuously, drawing herself up to her full height and casting her most sincere, wide-eyed gaze at the older woman.

"Yes, on _Saturday night_." Before Sharon could become righteously indignant, Brenda's lips twitched into a small smile and she relented. She nodded toward the unmistakable hunk of Tupperware in the deputy chief's other hand. "I assume that isn't evidence."

When Brenda Leigh batted her eyelashes like that, Sharon thought, she looked like Bambi. The older woman found the thought surprisingly amusing. "Why, it's a generous slice of my delicious homemade triple chocolate cake just for you, capt'n," the blonde gushed in a tone that would've done the Junior League proud.

"In that case," Sharon replied seriously, but she couldn't keep the sparkle from her clear green eyes, "maybe you'd like to come in, chief."

The captain had seen that triumphant glint in the other woman's eyes on more than one occasion, and she knew exactly what it meant. Free and easy newly-single Deputy Chief Johnson had been bored, and maybe lonely, at home by her lonesome on Saturday night, so she'd decided to 'investigate' Sharon. She'd meant it when she'd said that she felt sure Brenda was perfectly capable of surprising her; she could also be utterly predictable.

Gesturing for the blonde to precede her into the snug little slate-shingled house, Sharon shrugged philosophically. Why not invite the chief to partake in her evening ritual of red wine and Rachel? As long as this southern belle wasn't a Republican (and Sharon truly didn't think_ that_ badly of her), it could be mildly entertaining. Besides, the woman had brought cake.

Brenda peered around keenly as the captain shooed her toward the kitchen, peeking into a small home office lined floor to ceiling with books and a darkened living room as they went. She was unembarrassed by the sensation of Sharon's eyes trained on her back, observing her as she observed each minute quirk and detail of the other woman's home, because she was content in the knowledge that the captain would do the same if their roles were reversed.

The open-plan kitchen, with its sand-colored walls and glossy burnt-brick tile flooring, was pleasantly warm. A pot of water seethed on the stove's back burner, nearing the boiling point, while a medley of yellow squash and zucchini, surely the ones Brenda had noticed in Sharon's basket last night, waited on the worktop beside a half-chopped onion; and a large knife rested beside the most essential of cook's tools, a half-full glass of red wine. An open laptop sat on the glass-topped dining table.

"I interrupted your dinner," the blonde observed brightly. "What're you makin'?"

"Just pasta." Sharon quirked an eyebrow as she spoke her obligatory line. "Have you eaten, chief?"

Brenda looked so pleased that Sharon couldn't even be irritated by the woman's bald-faced insinuation of herself into her evening plans and personal space. "No, I haven't."

"Since you've dropped by with this highly important document -" and the cake - "you can stay, if you'd like." She easily picked up the knife and used it to gesture, a move that made her companion slightly nervous. "I'm doing whole-wheat fusili with squash, zucchini, a little onion, and pesto." Expectant eyes fixated on Brenda, awaiting her response.

Brenda Leigh dimpled. "That sounds great, Sharon, and I don't really have anything at home to cook."

Sharon smirked as she sliced the squash. "I know,_ Brenda_. There's another chopping knife in that block right behind you. Feel free to do your worst with the zucchini."

A look of pure delight crossed over Brenda's face as she set down her purse and rolled up her sleeves. "I'm surprised you're trustin' me with such a vital task."

Sharon smirked. "Not even_ you_ can screw up zucchini."

Brenda pursed her lips as she reached for the chopping knife. "I don't know where you got this idea that I'm some sort of klutz," she began, holding onto the vegetable as she sliced off the top. "Do you really think I'm that incompetent?" Her tone was light, almost teasing, but Brenda couldn't deny the older woman's uncanny ability to play into every self-conscious thought buried in the recesses of her mind.

Sharon merely flashed her that barely-there smirk and continued dicing her squash into perfectly equal-sized chunks.

The blonde rolled her eyes, something she seemed to habitually do in the captain's presence. "You just love messin' with me, don't you?"

"I can't help it, chief. You're just so easy."

Brenda scoffed. "I'm not as easy as you think," she replied. When she registered the double entendre, she nearly sliced off the top of her finger. Thankfully for her, Sharon didn't seem to notice. "Y'know," she added, not wanting to give the other woman the time to ponder her sexual habits (or lack thereof), "I wasn't sure if you'd want the cake. I'm a little surprised you did."

"You certainly took a gamble, then, driving all the way here to give me a slice," Sharon replied, watching as the chief deftly sliced the zucchini into uneven shapes. They were, at least, proportional to the size of the squash. "Why were you surprised?" she finally asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.

"I thought you might be one of those health nuts. I sort of imagined you as the type to count calories in a little notebook or somethin'."

Sharon wanted to ask when exactly the chief had pondered her eating habits, but decided against it. "Just because I eat healthy doesn't mean I don't appreciate dessert."

"Good," Brenda said, setting down her knife and leaning against the counter, her arms folded across her chest. "I don't trust women who don't like dessert. They're.._.unnatural_."

The brunette snorted into her wine glass. "Lucky me. Would you like a glass?"

"Sure. What is it?"

"Pinot noir," Sharon answered, pouring a second glass.

"I prefer Merlot."

"I hadn't noticed."

Brenda pursed her lips at the other woman's obviously feigned nonchalance and accepted the wine. Like the deputy chief, the captain let no detail, no matter how small, pass her by. She even paid attention to those pesky little matters of rules and regulations that Brenda preferred to ignore. "At least you eat dessert," Brenda reiterated.

"I'd think that by this point I've proven my trustworthiness in other ways, but all right." Sharon spoke lightly, pausing to wipe her hands on the dish towel that hung on a rack beside the sink, but the blonde recognized the note of underlying sincerity; it perfectly matched the one that had sounded in her own voice just a moment earlier when she'd asked if Sharon thought she was incompetent. "I'll eat the cake, if that's what the situation requires."

Brenda grinned. "You always struck me as the type of woman who'd be a martyr to a really good cause."

"And that good cause is your approbation?" Sharon returned, looking over her shoulder with a slight smile.

"No, captain. It's dessert. - Can I do anything else?"

"If the water's boiling, you can go ahead and add the pasta."

Brenda moved around, dumping the contents of the Barrilla box into the large pot and taking the opportunity of her proximity to the stainless-steel refrigerator to examine the smattering of magnets and photos on its doors. There were several postcards - from Istanbul, Seoul, and Bangkok, for starters - a reminder about a dental appointment, and multiple snapshots of a dark-haired toddler. A younger Sharon posed with two dark-haired preteens, a silver-haired couple drank champagne from crystal flutes, and, in black and white, a slender girl with extremely long, extremely straight hair stood with a shorter, curvy, dark-skinned girl in front of some sort of bonfire, both captured with their mouths open, apparently shouting. Brenda scrunched her nose up, squinting to see better, and wished she had her reading glasses within arm's reach. "Is this you, Sharon?"

The older woman murmured affirmatively as she swirled a modest amount of olive oil in a non-stick pan, although, upon closer inspection of the photo, Brenda Leigh didn't need the confirmation. She recognized the familiar bone structure, the unmistakable shape of the open mouth. The chief did a double take. "Oh, my Lord. Is this -? Sharon, you're burnin' your bra!"

Clear eyes met Brenda's as Sharon offered a lofty expression and the barest quirk of her lips. "Yep," she agreed. "We were at a NOW rally." The younger woman laughed, and Sharon pointed out, "It was 1975, Brenda. Bra-burning was pretty blase by then, really, but we were young and 'developing our political consciousness.'"

"You 'bout eighteen here?"

The captain nodded as she added the onion to the hot oil. Before Brenda could complete her mental math Sharon said, "I'm fifty-four."

"Oh, I wasn't -"

"Sure you were." Sharon was smiling, though.

"I didn't know for sure if you'd be home. I thought you might have plans on a Saturday night."

"I might have, but I don't - not unless someone on the force discharges a weapon, anyway." After moving the onions around, Sharon deposited her spatula on the spoon rest and moved to a cabinet above the dish drainer, from which she removed two bright red pasta bowls. "I haven't left the house today," she confided with a conspiratorial lifting of her brow. "Sometimes I like to be a hermit when I have that rare luxury."

Brenda nodded and sipped her wine, hopping up to one of the stools at the counter now that her part of dinner prep seemed to be over. "I know what you mean. I'd almost forgotten how nice it can be just to be by yourself sometimes."

Sharon eyed the other woman as if considering carefully before murmuring, "Yes. Although returning to living alone after having lived with other people for a while can be a big adjustment."

Not so long ago Brenda would have been surprised to learn that Sharon Raydor possessed that much unobtrusive tact, but not now. They'd never spoken about Brenda's separation and divorce (which should be final any day now), but of course everyone at work knew, especially once it became common knowledge that Agent Howard had put in for a transfer whenever something became available on the East Coast. "Yeah," she agreed. "It's nice to be able to do whatever you want with your own space, though, and not have to answer to anybody."

The fine skin around Sharon's eyes crinkled when she smiled. "Is that your way of saying you leave your laundry on the floor, your dishes in the sink, and don't have to make the bed?"

"I am _not_ a slob," Brenda protested defensively. Sharon responded with a level gaze. "Well," the chief qualified, "I'm not the greatest housekeeper, but I'm not terrible. Just because I don't make the bed the second I get out of it or wash the dishes as soon as I finish eating, that doesn't mean I won't do it eventually." She looked speculatively around the tidy kitchen, craning her neck to peer again into the adjoining living area. "You're probably a neat freak."

"No," Sharon replied honestly, adding the zucchini and yellow squash to the frying pan with the now-translucent onions. "Try living with kids and pets. That will make anyone less fussy about a little dust and dirt."

Brenda shivered with comic exaggeration. "No, thank you," she said decidedly, swigging the pinot noir. "Although, I confess to missin' my cat. I don't even know if my building allows pets. Fritzi kept her. Maybe he'll even take her when he finally moves." She sighed wistfully.

"What's her name?"

"Joel." Sharon arched an eyebrow and Brenda laughed. "Sorry._ He._ I'm a terrible pet owner, really. They just sort of happen to me by accident. I miss havin' another livin' thing at home though...now I just find I'm talkin' to myself more than is probably healthy."

"I'm not sure how healthy it is to be talking to cats," Sharon replied, moving between stirring the pasta and the vegetables. "As long as you don't expect a response..."

"Ha ha," Brenda quipped dryly. She sipped her wine, which really wasn't that bad, and watched as Sharon moved around her kitchen with practiced ease. She looked incredibly comfortable, as if she belonged in such a casual, domesticated role. It occurred to her that she really only knew a tiny sliver of who Sharon Raydor really was. There was the head of FID and then there was a single (was she single? dating?) woman who lived alone and clearly enjoyed her solitude. This Sharon, the one who cooked in her bare feet (her toenails were painted a deep burgundy color) and wore yoga pants instead of Armani, was softer, more human. She was a mother, a bra-burning feminist, and probably an amazing cook (if the pleasant aromas had anything to say about it).

It wasn't until she acknowledged this other side of her co-worker that Brenda realized just how relaxed she was in her presence.

"You're staring," Sharon remarked, and Brenda realized that she was.

"Not starin' - just observin'."

"Are you sizing me up like one of your suspects, Chief Johnson? Trying to figure me out?"

Brenda grinned. "Maybe."

Sharon was surprised by just how annoyed she wasn't. "And? What observations have you made?"

The blonde leaned in, bubbly with excitement at the prospect of piecing together one Sharon Raydor. Sharon typically hated games, but she found herself unspeakably curious about whether or not she'd fit the blueprint the chief had devised in her pretty little head.

"All right. Let's see. You do yoga?" she guessed, deciding to start out small on the slim chance that she was wrong.

"Almost every day," Sharon confirmed.

Brenda's eyebrows climbed her forehead. "Really?" She tried to imagine the captain in one of those obscenely flexible, bendy poses and merely chuckled at the prospect.

"Is that so hard to believe?"

"Well, forgive me for sayin', you seem a little too... tense..."

Sharon laughed. "Which is exactly why I do it. You'd be amazed at how therapeutic yoga can be." She pursed her lips, giving the willowy blonde a once-over. "You should try it. I think you of all people could benefit from it."

The blonde scrunched her nose. "I dunno if I have the patience for all that stretchin' and bendin'... besides, I'm not that tense."

Sharon snorted. "Right." She met Brenda's challenging stare and decided to revisit the topic later, perhaps when the deputy chief was loose-limbed following her wine. "What else have you surmised about me?"

"Mmm...you and your kids clearly won the genetic lottery," Brenda stated, nodding to the photograph on the fridge.

Something Brenda didn't yet know this woman well enough to identify flickered through the depths of Sharon's eyes and for an instant she stiffened. Brenda was able to watch as the captain actually forced herself to relax, maybe by doing some of that yoga-style deep breathing. "Thank you," she said politely.

"You're a good cook," Brenda continued, and Sharon snorted.

"I don't starve, but my kids would tell you I'm no gourmet."

The blonde shrugged. "This looks close enough to me. You know what's funny? I love to watch all those cookin' shows, but I just_ hate_ to cook."

"It can be difficult to cook for one. It took me a while to figure it out after the kids left home; I kept having to throw away spoiled food. I usually prepare enough for two meals and just eat the leftovers later."

Brenda Leigh bit her lip. "I just order delivery."

Sharon smiled. "Oh, I do my fair share of that too. It's one of the benefits of living alone. But it's nice to cook sometimes. Use it or lose it, you know." So saying, she stepped lightly over to the stove and took up the pasta, which she drained quickly before dumping it back into the pot. "No fancy serving dishes tonight," she added by way of explanation. Brenda watched her add the vegetables and remove a jar of what appeared to be homemade pesto from the refrigerator. Her long, elegant fingers - they were bony, really, but somehow on the dark-haired captain that made them no less elegant - seized a spoon from a drawer and she scooped a generous amount from the jar, but then hesitated, glancing at Brenda. "Do you mind if I go ahead and add the sauce?"

"Oh, no." The chief smiled. "I have no dietary, religious, or philosophical objections to pesto."

"Good. I don't trust women who don't eat pesto," Sharon mimicked, and Brenda realized with a not-unpleasant jolt of surprise that her erstwhile hostess was teasing her.

"Well, it's nice to know what you value in life, Captain Raydor."

"Likewise, Chief Johnson." Sharon lifted her wineglass and rather jauntily clinked it against Brenda's, and Brenda felt her small smile widen because that casual toast was the kind of thing a friend did, and the more time she spent in Sharon's kitchen, the more she liked the idea of being her friend.

"Here - go ahead and fix your plate, and there's parmesan if you want it." Sharon reached back into the fridge and Brenda expected to see the familiar green-and-yellow Kraft shaker emerge, but the older woman instead produced a hunk of real cheese and a grater. Brenda obediently scooped pasta into one of the bowls, but refrained from adding cheese. Part of her still suspected that the captain was a closet calorie-counter who would judge her harshly for such an indulgence.

"More wine?" Sharon asked, following in Brenda's wake. "That was left from last night, but we can open another bottle. It's right there." She directed the blonde toward the appropriate cabinet.

"Which one?" Brenda leaned down and gazed at the assortment of bottles. Here was another reason she thought she and Sharon might be able to become real friends: the woman had a well-stocked liquor cabinet, heavy on the red wine.

"I bought them all, so you pick. Do you mind opening it?"

"Oh, no. That's something I'm actually good at."

Sharon handed her the corkscrew, and after Brenda had made short work of the cork in the bottle of pinot noir she'd chosen (there were Merlots too, but she figured it was a safer bet to stick with what Sharon had selected for herself), she looked back to see Sharon re-wrapping the hunk of parmesan. A generous heap of its shavings now adorned the captain's pasta, and Brenda Leigh realized she'd missed an opportunity.

Ever-watchful green eyes caught the mournful look on the younger woman's face and Sharon nearly laughed. She brandished the cheese and the grater. "Don't hold back on my account."

Brenda sheepishly bit her lip as she accepted the cheese.

"You don't mind my knowing that you eat your weight in confectionery junk, but you're shy about cheese?" Sharon smirked mirthfully. "Why Brenda Leigh, do I make you nervous?"

Brenda wrapped up the cheese and, noticing an errant shaving on the counter, caught it with her finger and brought it to her lips. "Not nervous. Just...aware. I'm not used to spendin' time with people outside of work who don't know me all that well."

Sharon found herself taken aback by the other woman's blunt honesty. Taking up her bowl and wine glass, she gestured to the table. Though there were two bar stools, Sharon wasn't quite sure that she was ready to bump knees with Brenda while they shared a companionable meal. She did, however, fold herself into her chair at the end of the table, curling one leg beneath her in an effort to maintain the relaxed atmosphere. It was so much different to eating on her own. "I like to think I know you fairly well, Brenda."

Brenda sat down on the chair to Sharon's left, accidentally brushing her knee against Sharon's bare foot when she crossed her legs. She set down her bowl. "I thought I knew you too, but then..." She gestured around her, from the orchid in the corner (was that her favorite flower, or was it merely decorative?) to the candle on the counter (what scent?). "There's so much I don't know."

"Yet." Sharon tapped her finger on the stem of her glass. "And you hate not knowing things, don't you?"

"D'you have to ask?" Brenda asked with a breathless laugh. She held up her glass of wine. "Here's to gettin' to know each other better."

Sharon paused for a moment, observing the openly hopeful gleam in Brenda's eyes. She considered what this might mean - were they going to be _friends _now? Did they have to get along at work? Was her comfortable existence as a hermit about to be disrupted? She took up her glass and clinked it against Brenda's, deciding then and there that maybe her life icould/i use a little disruption. "I can drink to that. Now: eat your dinner. I promise that healthy food doesn't bite."

"If you say so." Swallowing her sip of wine, Brenda eyed her bowl of food with skepticism. "I sure hope I was right about you knowin' how to cook."

Sharon narrowed her eyes. "And we have yet to see if you know how to bake."

Brenda gaped. "All right, fine. I won't pre-judge your cookin' if you don't pre-judge my cake."

"Fine."

They both took a bite of their food, chewing in unison, before Brenda burst out: "This is good!"

"You don't have to sound so surprised, chief."

The blonde shrugged unapologetically. She'd show the captain what surprised really looked like, or, more accurately, the captain would show her. "Whatever," she replied, her tone breezy, as she forked a couple of chunks of squash and a bit of the curly pasta. "You just wait 'til you try my cake."

Perhaps inevitably, or perhaps because this rather obvious getting-to-know-you conversation was certain to become stilted if it was allowed to go on too long, they transitioned to desultory chatter about work. Both women avoided broaching any serious or inflammatory issues while they steadily emptied their bowls, sticking instead to anecdotes of the milder variety, and finally Brenda said, "I'll do the dishes."

Sharon rose seamlessly - maybe there was something to that yoga business after all - and carted both bowls over to the sink. "No, not this time," she replied, running her fingers through her hair and tumbling the long layers. _This time_ implied a next time, and that made Brenda Leigh smile. "You're a guest," Sharon added, and the deputy chief couldn't help wondering if the captain's mama had been anything like Willie Rae.

Brenda looked around the kitchen, feeling a little awkward as she sat there leisurely finishing her wine while Sharon bustled around, quickly cleaning up the small, contained mess. Good manners dictated that it was time for her to go, and yet -

"Are you gonna eat your cake?"

Sharon shot her a derisive glance as she quickly but precisely wiped the counters. "Of course I'm going to eat it."

"Right." Brenda tipped her glass up and let the last tiny droplets of pinot noir slide down her throat. "But I meant now."

The taller woman tossed the dishcloth across the edge of the sink and folded her arms over her chest as she turned back to smirk at her companion. "You want to see me open my present, is that it?"

The blonde pursed her lips, refusing to give in to embarrassment. "I could order you."

Sharon snorted out an undignified laugh. "To eat cake?"

Brenda grinned and nodded emphatically, her curls bouncing and swaying over her sloping shoulders. "Yes, captain. As your superior officer, I could, at my discretion and for the greater good, hereby _order_ you to eat that cake right now."

The captain's cheeks hollowed as she folded her lips together with suspicion. "Wait. I find your eagerness a bit disconcerting, chief. You didn't poison the cake, by any chance?"

Brenda made a harumphing sound in her throat. "Did you poison the pasta?" she retorted.

"I was also eating the pasta," Sharon pointed out, and then her folded arms went slack. "Wait. Is this an elaborate ploy to get me to share with you?"

The deputy chief bit her lip.

"Honestly, Brenda," the older woman continued, sounding disgusted, "don't you have the rest of the damn thing at home?"

"That's not it," Brenda Leigh protested a little too hotly. "I just wanna see you enjoy it. What's wrong with that?"

Dark hair shimmered as Sharon shook her head. "Absolutely not a thing, Lady Bountiful." She opened the drawer that Brenda had already marked as the silverware drawer and fished around for half a second, and then snagged the Tupperware container with her left hand. Returning to the table, she plopped the cake down between their empty wine glasses and then held up two forks.

Brenda grinned with delight, and Sharon grinned right back. "More wine?" the hostess offered.

"Well, maybe just a drop."

Sharon lifted the bottle and poured for both of them, and then removed the lid from the Tupperware container. Brenda watched her expectantly. Sharon sank her fork into the moist layers and came away with a modestly-sized morsel of chocolate and more chocolate. Brenda's studious gaze never left her face as she brought the fork toward her lips, but before it made contact, Sharon paused.

"Thank you for bringing dessert - and for the report," she added as an afterthought. She realized that she had enjoyed Brenda Leigh's company enough that she'd forgotten all about the purported impetus for this little impromptu dinner party.

Brenda nodded and flushed slightly. "Thank_ you_ for dinner. Maybe, um - maybe we could do it again? At my apartment? You could be my first company."

"Sure," the brunette agreed, and then darted a quick look at her loaded fork. "As long as the cake isn't poisoned."

With an exasperated eye-roll, Brenda seized her own fork, stabbed at the cake, and shoved a huge bite into her mouth. "There," she said, the word distorted, ignoring forty-plus years of her mother's insistence that she not talk with her mouth full, "satisfied?"

Smirking, Sharon closed her lips around her own fork and carefully sucked every last trace of the decadent chocolate from its prongs. "It's delicious," she admitted after she had chewed and swallowed (showing off her own superior table manners, the chief thought), going for a second, more generous, bite.

"I know," Brenda Leigh replied smugly. "Imagine how much better it coulda been if I'd had the right kind of chocolate. So, when d'you wanna come over for dinner?"

Sharon scanned her mental datebook, remembering that it had promised to be a particularly light work week (assuming none of the boys and girls of the LAPD went trigger happy). She had nothing planned for her Sunday aside from her plans to clean the bathrooms, but it seemed presumptuous somehow to suggest that they spend three evenings in a row in each other's company. "How does your Tuesday look?"

Brenda wiped her finger along the dollop of frosting that had stuck to the top of the container and proceeded to lick it off. "Sounds great."

"This time I'll bring dessert. You better cook me something decent."

The blonde paused and tried not to panic at the thought of learning a whole new recipe before Tuesday (she had over-indulged in the mashed potatoes and would _not_ be inclined to make them again for the foreseeable future, nor would she serve Sharon something as plain as clam linguine). Still, she had nothing to do on Sunday, so she had the whole day to shop for food and practice a thing or two before Tuesday. "You better not bring me a fruit salad," Brenda countered.

Sharon chuckled and shook her head. "I wouldn't dream of it."

The two women finished off the the cake, playfully fighting over who would get the prized corner bite that was heavy on the frosting, each surprised to find herself looking forward to Tuesday.

**


	2. Chapter 2

**Title: Since You Went Away - Chapter Two: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, _The Closer_**

**Word Count: 6839**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Authors' Note: Thank you so much for the warm reception you've given our story! We hope you enjoy the next installment. Oh, and never underestimate the motivational power of comments and feedback. ;) **

As it turned out, Brenda _didn't_ have time for grocery shopping - or anything else, for that matter. On Sunday afternoon, after tidying the bathroom and kitchen to passable standards, the deputy chief was called in to a double homicide. Greg Phillips and Omar Makher, two of three partners in a downtown law firm, were found shot to death in the office by the cleaning crew. What had followed were two and a half days of hectic investigating for Major Crimes, wherein Brenda interrogated the chief suspect, the third partner of the firm, until it was proven that his alibi was rock solid (albeit illegal, as he had spent the night in the company of an underage hooker). Brenda loved cracking a case and was unquestionably proud of herself when she proved on Tuesday afternoon that it had been Makher's wife, Lili, who had killed them upon discovering that the two men were engaged in a tawdry affair.

By the time Brenda had closed her case and returned to her apartment, she realized with alarm that the place was still in shambles, she had no food, and the captain would be arriving any minute.

Toeing her heels off her aching feet, Brenda kicked them under the coffee table and quickly got to work, stacking as many boxes as would fit into all of the little closets throughout the apartment. She frowned to herself when she realized that she had barely made a dent.

Sharon was going to mock her into next week.

Despite the potential embarrassment, Brenda found herself oddly looking forward to it. She couldn't remember the last time she'd had multiple plans with the same person in one week, unless you counted Fritz, which Brenda didn't. That had been different. Even when they weren't dating it had felt like they were, mainly because she'd known right away that he had feelings for her. This was something altogether new, something she hadn't done in more years than she could immediately remember: 'hanging out' with a friend, someone with whom Brenda could be herself without trying to attract or seduce.

The buzzer sounded and Brenda's excited glow was immediately replaced with an exaggerated eye-roll at Captain Raydor's unerring punctuality. She buzzed her up and opened the door, tidying the pile of mail atop the nearest stack of boxes. When that was done, she stuck her head into the hall and watched as Sharon rounded the bend at the top of the staircase carrying what appeared to be a pie dish covered in aluminum foil. "Hi there."

Sharon smiled and immediately sized up the blonde. "You look like you just got out of work."

"I did. Sorry...I should have called. I don't have dinner ready yet, so I was thinkin' maybe we could order takeout." Brenda stood aside, allowing the older woman to enter her apartment.

Sharon's eyebrows crept toward her widow's peak. "Would you prefer to reschedule?"

"No!" Brenda exclaimed too loudly and stepped back, waving the captain into the apartment. "No," she repeated in a more sedate, acceptable conversational tone, since she was inviting a dinner guest in rather than chasing a runaway perp. "Not unless you object to takeout."

"It depends on the type of takeout, but in general, no." Sharon smiled slightly as she stepped into the apartment, and then she stopped abruptly - just for a split-second, so that it was really just a falter in her stride more than anything else, but Brenda noticed it and felt herself blush again. She stood behind the other woman, surveying her own apartment and trying to see it the way Sharon must have been seeing it. Oh, good gracious. It looked even worse than she had realized, with boxes towering everywhere, no furniture to speak of, and the unrelieved blankness of the off-white walls.

"Um," Brenda began, and then stopped. "I'm not really settled in yet."

Sharon offered a bland, neutral smile in response. "Where should I put the dessert?"

"In the kitchen, or just there on the table." Brenda gestured toward the circular craftsman-style wooden table she'd adapted for use as a dining table. The captain walked over and put down both the pie plate and her purse and set about shrugging off her lightweight coat, and the younger woman realized she hadn't heard the tell-tale clacking of heels. She glanced down. Ballet flats; purple ballet flats. "I like your shoes," she heard herself say.

Sharon's expression of polite neutrality warmed. "Thanks, Brenda." She spoke carefully, as if reminding herself that this was her maybe-friend Brenda Leigh, not Chief Johnson, and here she didn't have to worry about the potential annoyance of the blonde suddenly pulling rank. In fact, if she was so inclined, Sharon might be able to pull a little rank of her own; after all, she at least had proper grown-up furniture and some artwork on her walls. She draped her jacket over the crook of her elbow and surveyed all she could see of the deputy chief's abode. "I love what you've done with the place," she commented, her mouth twisting into a smirk that somehow crept over her whole face.

Brenda flushed with a combination of well-deserved embarrassment and a dash of indignation. "It's a work in progress."

"Where's the progress?" Sharon retorted pertly, and Brenda's lips parted before she caught the amusement clearly dancing in those mossy green eyes, and she grinned ruefully.

"You shoulda seen how the last tenant left it," she joked. "I got a great deal on the rent 'cause I found it when we raided a crack den. I'll have this place in _House Beautiful _in no time."

"Double-page spread," the brunette agreed. "What will they call this particular aesthetic? Early-modern vagrant? Frat-boy chic?"

"I had no idea you were such a snob," Brenda retorted, wincing.

"And I had no idea _you_ thought a futon was furniture," Sharon fired back, just as quickly and snappily as if they were at work, swatting at one another across the dual barriers of their red and yellow crime-scene tape. "Where do you usually tap the keg, hmm? Right here in the living room? There's plenty of space for it."

"I believe we've already established that it's a bit bare. I just don't have much furniture yet."

"You're nearly fifty."

"I'm forty-seven! And I meant most of it was Fritzi's."

"Oh. Yes." Brenda knew Sharon was a little uncomfortable, whether due to the mention of Fritz or because she feared she'd crossed a line with her teasing, because she shoved her hands into the pockets of her slim-fitting grey pants. Furthermore, Sharon knew she knew.

"Can I get you somethin' to drink?" the hostess asked, surprisingly eager to put her guest at ease. "I have water and some Diet Coke, and wine, of course -"

"Just water for now, thank you." Sharon smiled slightly, looking relieved.

"Come on in here," Brenda called as she sauntered into the kitchen, and when she heard Sharon just behind her she removed a binder from atop the refrigerator and handed it to the older woman. "Menus," she explained. "Organized alphabetically by type of cuisine." The captain looked flabbergasted, and Brenda smiled smugly. "See? I can be very organized."

"When it suits you," Sharon muttered, beginning to flip the pages. Brenda placed a tumbler filled with ice water on the counter beside her.

"When it's _important_," the chief countered insouciantly. "I haven't found a really great Chinese restaurant yet, but oh, that Jamaican place is good, if you like spicy." Brenda reached across her companion and indicated the menu. "I don't feel much like Japanese, but we could do Korean... This North African restaurant is really good too, if you're more in the mood for somethin' like that."

Sharon looked up with that soft, warm smile Brenda had seen so seldom within the halls of the LAPD. "My, my, Brenda Leigh. I had no idea your culinary tastes were so diverse."

Brenda bristled automatically, if half-heartedly. "Why, because I'm from Georgia, and all southerners live on barbecue, fried chicken, and sweet tea?"

"No," the brunette replied as if she were the one who'd been affronted, "because I have _absolutely no idea_ what you like to eat, unless it's coated in chocolate. And there's nothing wrong with barbecue, fried chicken, _or_ sweet tea."

"Now I have a hard time imaginin' _you_ indulgin' in a good Southern meal. I bet you run screamin' from all that grease and cholesterol."

"Aren't you forgetting Christmas in the murder room? I _was_ there, if you recall."

Brenda snorted. "Oh yes. How could I forget? Only you could burn marshmallows."

"They most certainly were not burnt. They had your mother's personal seal of approval."

"She always was the placatin' type." Noting Sharon's imperiously arched eyebrow, Brenda raised her hands in a gesture of surrender. "I kid, I kid."

Sharon flipped a few more pages and tapped her finger on the menu of a homestyle restaurant that claimed to have the best Southern fried chicken west of the Mississippi. "I can get my hands dirty with the best of them, Brenda Leigh. I'm _not_ afraid of food."

Brenda smirked. "That wasn't a challenge, Sharon."

"I know, but now I'm craving cornbread."

"Me too!" The blonde sighed in relief. "I'm so glad you said that." She poured another glass of water and retrieved her cell phone. "What d'you want? I'll call it in."

Sharon observed as Brenda called in their order of fried chicken, black eyed peas and rice, collard greens, fried okra, and corn bread, noting with a smirk that the blonde didn't need to give her address. She wondered if Brenda Leigh was ever homesick for Atlanta the way she was sometimes homesick for Philadelphia. Had she felt dislocated when she left Atlanta for Los Angeles? Had she ever considered going home?

Sharon sipped at her water (Brenda at least had actual glasses) and cast her eyes about the sparse kitchen. Was it laziness on Brenda's part that she hadn't taken the time to customize her living space to her personal taste, or was it reluctance to adapt to a significantly large and permanent change in her life? She'd been lucky that her husband had "graciously" conceded to her keeping the house in the divorce settlement; it had smoothed the transition for herself and the kids, leaving them to deal with the emotional upheaval in the comfort of the home they'd grown up in.

Did Brenda miss Fritz? Sharon knew very little about the details of their divorce and found herself curiously imagining what had been the breaking point in what had appeared to be a relatively solid marriage. She supposed it hadn't been as solid as she had always assumed, remembering from experience that things were so rarely what they seemed. Brenda Leigh Johnson was proof of that.

Mimicking Brenda's examination of her own kitchen, Sharon stepped closer to the refrigerator and glanced over the pictures that were displayed with bare magnets. There were a few snapshots of Brenda's parents, whom Sharon remembered vividly, a picture of a fluffy white cat and another of an orange cat, and a formal portrait of a young brunette girl in a graduation cap and gown.

"That's my niece, Charlie," Brenda offered, coming up behind Sharon.

"She's beautiful," Sharon remarked, noting the similarities between the girl and the deputy chief. Their eyes were the same, wide and brown and gleaming.

Brenda nodded, blonde curls bouncing against her shoulder. "She's a good girl. Makes great brownies," she added with a laugh, smirking secretively in a way that piqued Sharon's interest. "Food'll be here in thirty minutes. Wanna sit in the living room?"

"Lead the way."

Brenda did just that, curling up on one end of the futon, carefully adjusting the floral skirt that had ridden up over her thigh. Sharon narrowed her eyes at the futon and gingerly eased herself into a seated position.

"Brenda, this is honestly the most uncomfortable excuse for a couch I've ever sat on."

"And you've already decided that after 2.5 seconds?"

"Yes," Sharon sniffed, "I have. First of all, when I sit down on something couch-like and it _slides across the floor_, I become very dubious."

Despite the fact that her furniture was being insulted, Brenda could work up nothing other than amusement at Sharon's pedantic explication of the rules of sofa-dom. Of course the woman had a list of criteria; she probably had rules for everything. "What else, capt'n?"

"Removable cushions: it should have them. And I, personally, am in favor of armrests, although your mileage may vary." Sharon stopped and considered thoughtfully.

"And?" Brenda prompted.

"Those are the essentials, really. Optimally, it shouldn't come in a box. Some assembly should not be required."

"Thank you so much for your invaluable advice. You ever considered a change of careers?" the chief quipped, and Sharon chuckled.

"You should _be_ so lucky." The older woman gazed musingly at the sea of boxes surrounding their little island. "Really though, Brenda, from what I've seen, this is a great apartment. The building is nice, the neighborhood's great - How are you planning to decorate?"

Brenda hesitated. She'd known Sharon would ask; she should've rehearsed an answer. But on the other hand, wasn't this the kind of thing you were supposed to discuss with your friends? She thought of Sharon's cozy, tastefully-appointed home and took a breath. "I don't know," she admitted. "This is the first home I've ever had the chance to decorate completely for myself as an adult, and I guess I'm a little bit afraid of messin' it up. This is my fresh start." She darted a quick look at the other woman. "That's pathetic, isn't it?"

Sharon smiled that same gentle smile, the one that made her eyes glow. "I don't think so. When Paul and I divorced, I stayed in the house with the kids. We did it to make the transition easier for the children, but it was easier for me as well. I had enough to deal with without having to worry about paint samples and fabric swatches." She shrugged and sipped her water. "I've changed almost everything in the house since then, made it my own - especially since my children moved out - but it was a gradual process."

"You're certainly good enough at it," Brenda remarked. "I don't even know what my own personal style is. The last house was mostly Fritz and the one before came fully furnished. Belonged to a murdered Russian prostitute."

The brunette snorted. "At least tell me you flipped the mattress..."

"Eew! No. I got a new one. But the whole place wasn't my aesthetic at all. There were chandeliers everywhere..."

"I don't think you can do much worse than that," Sharon agreed. "Maybe it's time you put your own touch on the place, make it feel like your own."

"You sound like my mama. It's just so...daunting."

"It's not as bad as it sounds, Brenda. You just need a place to start and, really, you can't start with this futon. You need to get a real sofa, and then you can decorate around that."

"Is the futon really _that_ bad?" Brenda asked, bouncing on the hard little cushion.

"Yes, it really is. I'll even go with you to help you pick out a couch."

Brenda raised an eyebrow. "Is that just your way of makin' sure I do it?"

"Yes. Besides, if we're going to be friends, I need a couch I can actually get comfortable on." Sharon smirked. "I also thought you could use the moral support."

"Yeah...yeah, I could." The blonde smiled warmly, touched by the gesture. As she prepared to ask just when Sharon would be free to go furniture shopping, the house phone rang. "'Scuse me," Brenda said, getting to her feet. She crossed the room and peered down at the caller ID. _Fritz Howard_. She twisted her lips and bit the inside of her cheek and, with a bracing breath, decided to let it go to voicemail. "Never mind that," she added dismissively to Sharon as she sat back down.

Sharon glanced between Brenda and the ringing telephone, barely able to contain her surprise at the other woman's decision to ignore it. As she wondered just whom Brenda was avoiding, the automated voice message went off.

_"Hey Brenda. It's, uh, Fritz. You're probably working...I didn't want to bother you on your cell. Listen - I'm heading out of town for a few days this week and wondered if you'd be interested in feeding Joel while I'm gone. I know he misses you. Gimme a call when you have a moment."_

Brenda sat up a little straighter, a wistful expression overtaking her face. Sharon expected a comment about halcyon days with the FBI agent; what she got instead was a sad little "Joel."

_Of course_. "You can call him back, if you'd like," Sharon murmured. "Don't mind me."

"Oh, no. If I call him back now, it'll just look like I was avoidin' his call on purpose." Which she had been, plainly, but that was the kind of thing it was okay to share with your friend as the two of you chatted in your living room, but that it was politic to keep from your soon-to-be-ex-husband - although no doubt he avoided Brenda's calls as well... or would have done, if she'd called him.

They sat quietly for a moment. Sharon cast about for a topic of conversation that could be both innocuous and interesting. She hadn't turned one up when Brenda suddenly burst out, "Why'd you get divorced?"

Sharon wasn't as appalled as she should've been by the tactless question, because it came from Brenda Johnson, from whom she expected nothing else; and because she now felt comfortable enough with the blonde to respond by laughing and enjoying the younger woman's obvious mortification as she processed just what she'd asked. That, and it was intriguing to think about what might happen if they mutually agreed to forgo banal pleasantries. They'd certainly never bothered with them in their workplace relationship. She tilted her head, considering.

"You don't have to answer that," Brenda said quickly, and Sharon chuckled.

"Somehow I suspect that's not something you say often. - No, Brenda, I don't mind. Surely at this point we can be honest with each other."

The blonde relaxed again. "Yeah," she agreed. Besides, if the captain was willing to answer so freely, the story probably wasn't anything too horrible.

"We were married twelve years," Sharon said succinctly. "Jobs, stress, the kids - We just grew apart." It was her turn to shrug. "Not a particularly interesting story, is it? You've heard it before."

"Not from you," Brenda pointed out. She glanced at the blinking light on the answering machine. "So, uh, do you two talk? You and... Paul?"

"You have to talk if you have kids." The smirk reappeared. "Or cats, I suppose." Taking her cue from Brenda she asked, "What about you and Agent Howard?"

The smaller woman scrunched her features slightly. "I don't know why, but it sounds funny when you call him 'Agent Howard,'" she commented. "We... We just..." She trailed off with a helpless little sigh. "It's hard to put it into words. Outwardly nothin' much changed. It's - This is gonna sound ridiculous. You know how sometimes you have a really comfortable pair of shoes, ones you've had long enough that they're all broken in and you barely notice them on your feet, and then one day you're walkin' along and realize they've rubbed a blister?"

Both women instinctively looked down at their feet.

"I do," Sharon agreed just as the door buzzer sounded.

Brenda popped up, a movement that caused her end of the futon to bang into the wall. Sharon probably had a point about sofa-shopping. The chief grinned as she crossed the room to go deal with the delivery guy. "You know," she tossed over her shoulder, "until the other night I wasn't even sure you _had_ any comfortable shoes."

"You never asked," she heard the captain say from behind her. "I hope the cornbread's good."

The blonde glanced back again to sneer. "You're a Yankee," she said flatly. "What do you know about cornbread?"

"I know what tastes good," Sharon replied simply, heading into the kitchen. "Where are your plates?"

"Top right above the sink!" Brenda called back.

Sharon took down two plates, shocked that they matched (though they were the only two in the cupboard), and added dishes to the mental list of necessities that Brenda would need to buy if she had any desire to live like a grown-up and not a twenty-two-year-old co-ed. She set out the plates on the table as Brenda carried in the large bag of food.

"Mmmm mmm mmm!" Brenda enthused, inhaling deeply. "Smells _amazin'_!"

Sharon sniffed. "It does. Silverware?"

"Drawer closest to the fridge," the blonde replied, pulling containers out of the bag. When the bag was empty, she crumpled it up and deposited it in the trash, thankful that she had remembered to take out the garbage when she left for work that morning, and grabbed a few paper towels.

They sat at the table, each woman silently loading her plate with the steaming food. Sharon's stomach rumbled pleasantly; it _did_ smell good. Despite the fact that she very rarely ate fried food, Sharon was eager to indulge.

They reached for the cornbread at the same time, their knuckles accidentally colliding. "Sorry," Brenda said, immediately snatching up a piece. She took a bite, closing her eyes as she chewed and letting out a low moan.

Sharon felt like a voyeur watching Brenda eat. She blushed faintly at the woman's open display of pleasure in her food and looked away as she took her own bite of the bread. She nearly moaned herself; it was easily the best cornbread she'd ever tasted. When she looked back at Brenda, she realized the younger woman was watching her with smug satisfaction on her face.

"Good, isn't it?"

"Very," Sharon confessed.

The sound of chewing and the occasional hum of pleasure (from Brenda, of course) filled the small kitchen for several minutes while they ate. The shared silence was comfortable, Brenda found. She tore into her chicken, flicking her eyes from time to time to the woman sitting across from her. She had expected to see Sharon tearing the chicken off the bone with her fork and was thoroughly pleased to see the flash of the captain's teeth as she ate directly from the drumstick.

They were quiet for another few minutes, and then: "I was married before, you know."

Sharon swallowed, pondering Brenda's abrupt confession. "I hadn't known."

"Dennis. Didn't last long. He wasn't a very good guy, in the end."

Sharon wondered what had prompted the woman to blurt out this specific detail but had decided to allow Brenda to dictate the direction of the conversation. "Not a comfortable pair of shoes then?"

"Definitely not." Brenda pushed her collard greens around her plate. "I guess I just never thought I'd have two divorces under my belt at this point in my life."

Sharon nodded perceptibly. It explained a lot about Brenda, the more she thought about it, taking into consideration her past with Pope and her "comfortable" marriage with Fritz. Had she settled because Fritz was easy and expected?

"Sorry," Brenda interjected brightly. "I didn't mean to get all glum. Tell me more about you. What're your kids like?"

The captain hesitated briefly, having known the other woman would ask about them eventually. She decided to be conservative with the details - for now. "I have two children - a boy and a girl. They're... great. I'm very proud of them."

"Don't all parents have to say that?"

"I'm completely objective," Sharon replied with a soft smile. "Daniel's a lot like me: bright, very self-aware, very stubborn. Vivien's very much her own person; she's much more independent than Danny. Very proud, very sharp. Wise beyond her years."

"Just like their mama."

That something Brenda couldn't quite identify flashed through Sharon's eyes again. "Yes," she admitted. "Both in their own ways." She lowered the remains of her chicken to her plate as if she'd suddenly lost her appetite but, the other woman reflected, she was probably just full. They'd both been gobbling down their food as if it was going out of style.

"Don't forget there's pie," Brenda reminded.

"I'm not likely to forget since I'm the one who brought it." The sharpness in Sharon's voice was as surprising as it was unwarranted, and Brenda looked askance, but the brunette had returned her gaze to her plate and was giving the remains of her okra the eye. Brenda decided to let it go.

After maybe half a minute had ticked by Sharon shifted in her chair and returned her gaze to Brenda's. "My grandmother cooked like this," she said. "I barely remember her - she died when I was just in elementary school - but I remember those Sunday lunches at her house."

"Really?" Brenda inquired suspiciously, taking one last bite and then forcing herself to put her fork down before she exploded. "Cornbread and fried okra and -?"

"Every bit of it," Sharon confirmed. "I thought her cherry cobbler was the best thing in the world. Maybe it was. She was from Maryland," she added as an afterthought.

Brenda frowned. "No disrespect to your grandmother, Sharon, but Maryland isn't the South."

"You mean because they fought on the 'wrong' side in the Civil War?"

"I think you mean the War Between the States," Brenda teased.

Sharon hummed. "The War of Northern Aggression," she chimed in. "I think my grandmother would've disagreed with you, but you could've had a real meeting of the minds when it came to food. My mother used to tell this story about a time when she tried to make a southern-style dinner when my grandparents were visiting. She put sugar in the cornbread -"

"Yankee cornbread!" Brenda howled in dismay, and the other woman nodded.

"Grandmother never let her forget it."

Brenda drained the last of her water before speaking. "See, I knew you weren't all bad. You're a i_little/i_ bit southern."

Sharon smiled slightly and pushed her plate away. "High praise indeed. Let me do the dishes."

"Two plates and some silverware?" Brenda scoffed. "Leave 'em. Besides, we'll just mess up some more when we eat dessert."

At least that meant Brenda i_had/i_ some more dishes, the captain noted. "I don't think I can face dessert."

"Not right now, but you're not gonna rush off, are you?"

Brenda's features had tightened in genuine disappointment, and Sharon felt the pleasant warmth of being wanted. She let it chase away the vestiges of her gloomy thoughts, or at least push them further off on the horizon. "I'm not in a hurry," she admitted. "But I know you've had a tiring day, so tell me when you're ready to get rid of me."

"I will," Brenda agreed, "as long as you do the same."

It occurred to Sharon that not so very long ago either one of them would have done anything in her power to get rid of the other, and now here they were, tacitly admitting that they were enjoying one another's company. The thought made her smile, and Brenda smiled back with laughing intelligence in her dark eyes.

"I think I'll make coffee. Will you drink a cup?"

Green eyes narrowed. "Is it decaf?"

Brenda Leigh shuddered. "Definitely not. I wouldn't have the nasty stuff in the house."

"Good," Sharon replied decidedly. "Then I'll have a cup."

Brenda smiled again (she was doing a lot of that) as she stood and, without looking into the cabinet, reached unerringly for a paper filter. "You're not worried it'll keep you up all night?"

She couldn't see Sharon's face as she answered because her very first dinner guest had stood and was leaning across the table, gathering up the leftovers. "Oh, I don't really sleep that much anyway, not any more." Before Brenda could formulate a question, they both caught the sound of Sharon's cell vibrating inside her handbag. Sharon just cocked her head toward the living room, enjoying the fact that there was no need to explain that it might be work or apologize for the distraction. She left Brenda heaping generous scoops of pre-ground beans into the filter.

When she saw that the caller was Daniel, she considered just letting it go to voicemail - she could call him back later - but then she noticed that she had two other missed calls. Her stomach tightened as she whipped the phone up to her ear and accepted the call, answering with an anxious "Daniel?"

"Hey, Mom. You okay? You sound a little... tense."

Sharon closed her eyes and breathed out soundlessly. "I'm fine, honey. How about you? What's up?"

"Just called to say hi."

"You called me three times, 'just to say hi'?" Sharon demanded.

"Yes, _captain_, I did. You workin'?"

"No, but I'm with a friend, so can I call you back later?"

"Male friend?" her son asked, perking up.

Sharon's response was an exasperated sigh.

"Okay, a female friend. Is she single?" he continued doggedly.

"Good-bye, Daniel. Don't call me back tonight unless you've severed a limb."

"Love you too, Mommie Dearest," Daniel retorted, and they both hung up.

Brenda, who was stacking the takeout containers in the nearly-empty fridge, watched as Sharon turned back into the kitchen. "Everythin' all right?" She studied the mildly-annoyed expression on the other woman's face and recognized traces of concern.

"Everything is fine," Sharon replied, hoping that she was right. "That was my son."

Brenda frowned. "You seem...I don't know exactly. Is this your 'mom' face?"

The brunette laughed despite herself, knowing precisely which face the other woman meant. "I suppose it is. I'm sure everything is fine," she repeated, and she wondered who she was trying to convince. "Danny's been acting a little strange lately. I think he's lonely because his boyfriend is overseas."

Brenda didn't even blink at the admission and Sharon found herself overwhelmingly relieved. "At least in his loneliness he's just callin' his mama. Could be worse, right?"

The coffee maker hissed and spat as it dripped its brewing coffee into the pot. Sharon added "coffee maker" to her list for their shopping excursion. "True," Sharon conceded. "He keeps himself busy with school but I suppose that weekends are hard for him. I'm fairly certain that he's focusing on _my _problems rather than dealing with his own."

"_You_ have problems?" Brenda said lightly, taking down two mugs from the cabinet. "What's he studyin'?"

"He's a second year med student."

"Wow...isn't that snazzy? Must be nice to have your own doctor-in-training!"

Sharon chuckled. "His goal is psychiatry."

"No wonder he's focusin' on you - you're his first client."

"Don't push it," Sharon warned, pointing her finger in mock indignation, "or I'll introduce him to you. I bet you'd make a fascinating case study."

"Me? I'm just as sane as you are." Brenda flashed her brilliantly white teeth in a triumphant smile and removed the pot of steaming coffee. "Lemme guess - you take it black?"

"I like a little cream, actually," Sharon replied. "I'm sure you must be stunned."

"I am!" Brenda replied, doctoring each of the two mugs before carrying Sharon's to the table. She returned to her own and squeezed in a dollop of honey. "There we go," she said, sitting back down. "So, when do you wanna go furniture shoppin'?"

The brunette laughed. "Someone's suddenly eager."

Brenda blushed slightly. She wasn't eager to part with a large chunk of her paycheck to furnish her sad apartment, but she i_was/i_ eager for the company. She chose not to admit this, not wanting to somehow push the other woman away before she'd really even had the chance to enjoy their growing friendship. "Just thought I should put in for some Sharon-time. Think you can fit me into your busy schedule?"

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Oh yes, because my appointment book is just brimming with social engagements." She blew the swirling steam that rose from her cup and gingerly sipped at the coffee, trying to imagine this fictitious world of Brenda's where people were apparently lining up to spend time with her. "How's this weekend for you?"

"Sounds great. We can play it by ear at the end of the week." Brenda nursed her coffee and finally, when her stomach felt slightly less packed with food, she glanced at the aluminum-covered dessert. "I don't know if I can stand this much longer," Brenda confessed. "I'm dyin' to know what you made."

"Oh, it's a vegan chocolate pie, but I wanted to make it a little healthier, so I used carob instead of chocolate."

It was a good thing Brenda had just swallowed her latest sip of coffee, because otherwise she would've spit it all over her sweater, not to mention Sharon. She still managed to choke a little on her own saliva, but strenuously schooled herself not to let her horror show on her face. Vegan was bad enough, but the woman had brought her _imitation chocolate_?

Brenda Leigh flashed on the way Sharon's perfectly manicured nails had curled possessively around that crimson-wrapped chocolate bar. Wait a tic. Suddenly suspicious, she darted a glance at the other woman from narrowed mahogany eyes, and what her brother Clay Jr. would have described as a shit-eatin' grin spread over the captain's face.

"How are you this gullible?" Sharon demanded, reaching over to peel the foil away from the pie tin. "How do you _ever_ get anyone to confess?"

"I'm not gullible," Brenda groused, torn between being irked at the ease with which the other woman had manipulated her and delighted that she didn't have to eat vegan carob pie. "I just wasn't prepared, is all. That was a sneak attack."

Sharon's chuckle was low and devious. "I can be sneaky," she agreed, and removed the foil. "Voila. Chocolate peanut butter pie. Does that meet with your approval?"

Brenda looked down happily at the creamy whipped surface of the pie, the sight of a proper dessert chasing the clouds from her brow. "Ooh," she cooed. "Excellent work, captain."

"I'm going for a commendation," Sharon teased, licking a stray bit of pie-filling from the side of her thumb and rising fluidly. "Plates?"

"Oh, um, in the dishwasher," the blonde admitted bashfully. Sharon only nodded, not moved to make any disparaging comments about Brenda's makeshift housekeeping arrangements, and retrieved a couple of dessert plates.

"We don't need clean forks, do we?"

"My grandmama always said to keep your fork, 'cause otherwise you might not get any dessert."

Sharon nodded her approval. She'd noticed that Brenda's Georgia accent got thicker and thicker the more comfortable she felt, so she took this statement, proclaimed in an exaggerated drawl, as a good sign.

"Do you think I have an accent?" the captain asked suddenly, struck by the thought.

"Naw, you just sound like any other high-falootin' yankee."

Sharon's forehead creased. "Really?" she asked, a little disappointed.

It was Brenda's turn to laugh. "Well, I mean, you don't drink 'pop' or say 'yous guys' or anythin'," she pointed out. "I'd say you sound neutral."

Sharon traced the prongs of her fork over the top of the piece of pie Brenda had just cut for her, making a design, and rested her chin on her fist. "Do you know where I grew up, Brenda Leigh?" When the younger woman's curls danced in a negative head shake, the captain challenged, "Guess."

"Oh, um - back East?"

Sharon lowered her fork to the small plate and regarded the blonde steadily. "Why?" she asked. "You do this for a living. You notice some little detail about a person and you construct their whole life out of it. I'm simply curious to know if you've constructed mine."

Brenda smiled, studying the woman carefully. "You're still a mystery to me, Sharon. Isn't that a good thing?"

The brunette shrugged. "It depends, I suppose, on the nature of your assumptions about me. If you're right then yes, it's refreshing. If you're wrong, like so many people are, then..." She allowed her words to drift off and gave a sad smile.

"Like you said, I prefer not to make assumptions if I can avoid it. I like facts. I'm sure I've assumed a few things about you, but nothin' harmful...and nothin' that wasn't based on how you present yourself."

"Like what?"

"Like..." The blonde flushed hotly. "I guess...I always sorta assumed you were an ice queen."

Sharon snorted. "Believe it or not, that's not the first time I've heard that one."

"But that was only in the beginning, when we first started workin' together. You were so cold..." Brenda paused, setting down the fork beside her untouched pie, hoping to convey the seriousness of what she was saying. "I know that's not who you are. I've gotten to know you over the years. You're not as frigid and unaffected as you seem." Brenda bit her lip and continued. "And if you don't mind me sayin', I think you _want_ people to think that of you. I think it's a distancing tactic. People make incorrect assumptions about you 'cause you lead them to it."

"On second thought, I _don't_ think I'm going to introduce you to my son. Between the two of you, I'll be psychoanalyzed and figured out in no time," Sharon breathlessly admitted, a little stunned by how accurate Brenda Leigh had been. If she were honest with herself, she was also relatively relieved to know that Brenda was i_not/i_ one of the countless others who simply couldn't be bothered to try to understand her.

"Was I warm?" the blonde asked, arching an eyebrow.

"I wouldn't be here if you weren't," Sharon said. She stabbed at the corner of her pie. "Try your pie."

"I'm noticin' a pattern here," Brenda added, taking up her fork and gathering a bite of the dessert. "Whenever the conversation gets serious, you distract me with food."

Sharon smirked at Brenda's playful tone. "Is it working?"

"Depends on how good your pie is." She brought the fork to her mouth and closed her lips around the bite. She rolled the confection around her tongue, closing her eyes as the perfect mixture of chocolate and peanut butter melted together. "Mmmm...oh for heaven's sake," Brenda moaned, opening her eyes after swallowing. "That's _amazin'_."

Sharon merely laughed. "Is food always such a sexual experience for you?"

"Some of it is. My word...I think I'd marry whoever thought to combine chocolate and peanut butter."

"Third time's the charm?"

Brenda flashed a grin. "And don't you forget it."

"I never had you pegged as so..." Sharon trailed off, gesturing vaguely with her fork.

"Optimistic?" the blonde suggested brightly, and Sharon was glad they had separate dessert plates this time, because at the rate Brenda's pie was disappearing Sharon wouldn't have stood a chance.

"Dumb," the captain retorted tartly, and then took most of the sting out of the word with a smile. "No, optimistic works. I hope for your sake that the third time will be the charm, Brenda."

Brenda sat back slightly, propping her arms on the edge of the table as she considered. Not only was Fritz about the most tolerant mate imaginable, but they had similarly demanding jobs with similarly crazy work schedules. So if she hadn't managed to make a long-term relationship work with him, what chance did she stand with anyone else?

The thought was a depressing one, so she divided her attention between the pie and its maker. She slanted a look at her companion from beneath an angled eyebrow. "How 'bout you?"

Sharon blinked slowly as she chewed and swallowed. "The integration of chocolate and peanut butter has my whole-hearted support."

Brenda shook her head, unwilling to let Sharon get away with being completely disingenuous, not after that carob stunt. "What else do you do with your heart, Sharon?"

Green eyes were disconcerted for only a second. "Most people think I don't have one."

"I thought we'd just established that I'm not 'most people.'"

Sharon looked down at her pie as she scooped up another bite. Brenda noticed that she ate the crust first. She was buying herself a few seconds to scout up a suitable comeback; the chief let her, because she enjoyed their light verbal sparring. "No, Brenda Leigh, you certainly are not," the captain finally agreed, peering up from between long lashes as that sweetly patronizing smile curled her lips. "Most people have real sofas."


	3. Chapter 3

**Title: Since You Went Away **

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: T (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 8272**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Hold onto your hats, kids. The captain and the deputy chief are about to buy some furniture. Comments are our lifeblood...let us know what you think! Enjoy!**

**Chapter Three: Designing Woman**

"Well, well, _Captain_ Raydor." Louie Provenza placed his usual emphasis on her rank, keeping it slight enough that she couldn't call him out for being overtly insubordinate. "To what do we owe the displeasure of your company?"

"Last time I checked, lieutenant, your name wasn't on the door," Sharon responded smoothly, gliding across the break room with her eye on the prize: the coffee pot, its carafe still beautifully three-quarters full. She would have cheerfully endured - well, maybe not cheerfully; but she would have endured considerably more than the worst Provenza could toss at her to secure a proper cup of coffee. It was ten a.m. and her caffeine level was dipping dangerously low: the reusable filter in the antiquated coffee maker on her floor had acquired a sizable hole, dumping generous heaps of grounds into anything brewed in the machine. Sharon Raydor's mother had raised no fool, so the captain had high-tailed it to Major Crimes at the earliest possible opportunity, secure in the certainty that there would be an abundance of freshly-brewed coffee, and that it wouldn't be Folgers.

"Might as well be," Flynn replied, adding the tiniest slug of milk to his own coffee and sloshing it around in his mug. "Don't worry, Provenza - I bet if you ask nicely the captain won't take the last of the french vanilla creamer."

Sharon allowed herself a sedate smirk, screened from view by the curtain of her hair, as she grabbed a mug at random (it looked clean enough for government work) and filled it with the steaming dark brown liquid. She took a quick gulp, relishing the way the heat made her throat tingle without burning, and then topped up her mug. She was surprised Major Crimes still had anything as pedestrian as a regular coffee pot; she half expected to hear that Deputy Chief Johnson was demanding a full-on restaurant-ready cappuccino machine.

_Now, now, Sharon_, she schooled herself. _Brenda is your friend; you're not allowed to have nasty little thoughts like that about your friends, at least not until you become _really_ close friends. Just because the Major Crimes budget is approximately twenty times the size of FID's and you keep running out of pens that actually write, not to mention coffee -_

"Oh, Captain Raydor, _there_ you are. You're not in your office."

Obviously not, Sharon thought, as she hadn't yet figured out how to clone herself, but she merely cast Will Pope a solemn, inquiring look. "I just stepped out for a moment to get some coffee, chief. Did you need me?"

"Why hasn't your investigation into Sargent Velazquez's OIS been wrapped up?" Pope demanded, the tone of his voice suggesting his obvious disapproval.

Sharon immediately took a bracing breath, grinding her teeth in chagrin at the man's persistent need to butt into her affairs. Why was he still acting Chief of Police? She thought longingly of the days when Brenda had been up for the job and even spared a moment of remorse at having lost Chief Delk. She exhaled slowly. "There is still some question as to the validity of his claim of shooting in self-defense. We are following up on the possibility that he may have had a prior relationship with the victim."

The Chief sighed impertinently, and Sharon cast a quick glance at Flynn and Provenza, who were watching in rapt fascination. Flynn leaned closer to the other man, whispering something indistinguishable into his ear. Irritation flared up within her.

"I assure you, Chief, that we are doing everything we can to expedite the closure of this case."

"I hope so, Captain. We need him back in Robbery/Homicide."

She shoved her free hand into the pocket of her purple blazer and curled it into a fist, choosing not to point out that the evidence collected thus far indicated that Velazquez would _not_ be returning to his job and that the division would likely be short a detective. She pressed her lips into a thin line and nodded tersely. "Understood." She still had fifteen hours remaining in her reporting cycle; when her suspicions were confirmed, she would break the bad news to him then.

Before Sharon could excuse herself, the door of the break room burst open and in swept the seething blonde deputy chief.

Provenza turned to Flynn. "This is gonna be good."

Flynn looked askance at the older man - not that he disagreed with the sentiment, but _sotto voce_ his partner's gleeful growl was not. He shuffled toward the door, sweeping a reluctant Provenza along with him.

"_Will!_" Brenda cried demandingly, as if oblivious to the presence of anyone else. "Why do I have Commander Taylor in my murder room tellin' me David Gabriel needs to report to Robbery/Homicide right away? We are right in the middle of an investigation, and even if we weren't, I think if Robbery/Homicide is gonna be given permission to _poach_ members of my team I ought to at least be the first to _know_ about it!"

She planted her hands on floral-print-covered hips, arms akimbo, and scowled.

Flynn and Provenza exchanged a loaded look of anticipatory horror. Oh, this _did_ promise to be good.

Pope's features had taken on that long-suffering, oddly smug cast. "Thanks to a leisurely OIS investigation, Robbery/Homicide is down one detective, and they have four open investigations to your one in Major Crimes. Gabriel is the only qualified detective I can lend to them until Velazquez is cleared." The acting chief risked a small smile. "If you're not satisfied, Chief Johnson, take the matter up with Captain Raydor."

"Oh." The smaller woman's mouth opened and closed abruptly around the single syllable, and her gaze shifted to the dark-haired captain, who stood patiently by, cradling her coffee. Pope sidled casually toward the door, stopping just beside the two lieutenants. The three of them formed a row, all but pressing their noses against the glass of the break-room window. Brenda shifted her weight from one pump to the other. Sharon stood perfectly motionless, ready to conciliate or attack as necessary.

A moment ticked by while they eyed one another warily. Their brand-new friendship was about to be road-tested. The brunette took in the blonde's increasingly displeased expression and felt her stomach flutter unpleasantly, a reaction she attempted to squelch immediately. As the head of FID, it wasn't as if having people dislike her was a novelty. Even as she scoffed at herself, though, she acknowledged that she would be extremely - disappointed - if Brenda Leigh rejoined that list because Sharon was simply doing her job and doing it thoroughly.

"That's not wrapped up yet?"

"It's been fifty-seven hours," Raydor responded carefully.

"Fifty-seven, huh?" The barest hint of a smile flickered over Brenda's features as she turned toward the coffee pot. (Everyone else was drinking it; why shouldn't she?)

Sharon felt a flicker of hopefulness. "Fifty-six hours and -" she consulted her watch - "forty-seven minutes, to be precise."

"And you're very precise, captain." Brenda kept her voice pitched purposefully low, uninterested in putting on a show for the three men who were watching them as if they were a couple of caged lionesses. "You were probably on the math team in high school."

The other woman's only answer was a smirk.

"I can't see you with a pocket protector and thick glasses, though," the deputy chief continued.

Sharon snorted, very nearly spraying Brenda's sweater with coffee (which might have improved its appearance, in the captain's opinion), and her eyes twinkled. "Maybe I'll tell you someday." Or maybe she'd make Brenda guess what she'd been like as an adolescent; that could be good fun for a slow day in FID.

"Too bad about Velazquez. I don't suppose you have a rough idea of when he'll be...?" The smaller woman trailed off, smiling hopefully.

"OIS investigations are confidential," the captain replied evenly.

"Of course they are. But if, hypothetically, I had some big special assignment to give Detective Gabriel, say, tomorrow evenin' -?"

"Hypothetically and completely off the record, I'd suggest you make other arrangements."

Brenda pouted. "Well, that's inconvenient. Don't the officers of the LAPD realize that I need them all to behave so my squad stays intact?"

Sharon hid a grin in her cup as she took another slug of the steaming, ground-free coffee. "They must have missed the memo where they were asked to be on their best behavior solely for your benefit."

"And Tao typed it up all pretty, too," Brenda teased. She sighed, cocking her hip against the counter and turning her back completely to the windows, no longer wanting to acknowledge the presence of their audience. "I swear, Will's takin' extra delight in rufflin' my feathers lately."

"More so than usual?" the brunette asked, pursing her lips. She considered her earlier exchange with him and nodded. "I don't think it's just you."

"I heard somethin' somewhere about male menopause. If anyone's got it, it's him."

Sharon laughed and noted with mild annoyance that the three men outside the break room were exchanging perplexed glances. She couldn't recall the last time she had so much as broken a smile this early in the work day and decided to hold onto the pleasant, foreign feeling instead. "I think you may be right."

Brenda smirked and ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it back behind her shoulder. She rubbed at the tense knot at the nape of her neck, thinking again of having to work her case without Gabriel. She groaned. "Of all the times to lose Gabriel..." She stomped her foot.

Sharon felt for the blonde, fully understanding just how difficult it was to have members of her team shuffled around amidst departmental changes and setbacks. Brenda, she knew, took it particularly hard (and never without a fight). "Tough case?"

"Yeah." Brenda replied with a frown. She set down her coffee and crossed her arms over her chest. "Somethin's not sittin' right with me. We've got two dead twenty-year-old girls who appear to have suffocated themselves and I'm _still _waitin' on cause of death and it's takin' _forever_. Right now all we've got to go on is a letter that suggests it may have been some sorta suicide pact."

"That's a gruesome way to go," Sharon remarked, curling up her lip in distaste. "You don't think it's suicide?"

"No, I don't."

"Well, a triple came over the radio not too long ago, so I imagine Morales is up to his elbows, literally," the captain said, her tone laced with sympathy. "You might have to wait a little longer."

Brenda huffed out a sigh, blowing a strand of hair out of her eyes. "For heaven's sake, he's had my bodies since last night! That's it, I'm callin' down there right now." Yanking her phone from her pocket, Brenda's eyes widened in dismay as she stared at the black screen. What else could go wrong this morning? "Battery's dead," she said tersely. "You mind if I use yours?"

"Of course not." Sharon removed her own phone from her blazer pocket, unlocked the screen with a quick swipe, and passed it over. "It's in the contacts. Obviously."

As Brenda nodded her thanks and wasted no time, Pope called, "Oh, Captain Raydor?" With a quick chagrined look intended only for the deputy chief's eyes, Sharon briskly crossed the room and stepped out into the hall, calmly replying, "Yes, chief?"

Perhaps sadly, Brenda Leigh didn't need the help of Sharon Raydor's contacts list to dial the morgue; she knew the number from memory. The extension rang so many times that the chief very nearly gave up hope, and then heard the receiver being lifted from its cradle.

"Morales's Palace of Murder, Misery, and the Macabre. Tell me the stiff you're calling to inquire about is a drink or a cock, and not another gang member or co-ed."

Brenda felt her eyes widen to dimensions that would've done a missionary in a whorehouse proud. "Dr. Morales!" she exclaimed, scandalized and rather afraid their trusty pathologist had developed a fondness for the nose candy.

A long pause ensued. "Y-yes," stammered the pathologist. "Chief, ah, Johnson. I - I'm so sorry. I thought you were -"

"Captain Raydor," Brenda murmured, her eyes narrowing as she looked out into the hallway where the other woman stood talking with Pope, her face carefully expressionless. "Because I'm usin' her phone."

"Yes, chief. What can I do for you?"

Brenda didn't answer right away. She was distracted by the more immediate question at hand: why in the world would Morales answer the phone that way to Sharon Raydor, the tight-ass shrew of FID? Not, Brenda amended hastily, that she saw the captain that way, but almost everyone else in the LAPD did. She felt her stomach do something unpleasant as a peculiar feeling settled over her, something she hadn't experienced in ages.

Jealousy.

Why else would Dr. Morales be so casually blase with Captain Raydor if not for the fact that they were friends? Brenda hadn't actually thought that she was Sharon's _only_ friend, but it had simply never occurred to her to wonder who else might be in the captain's inner circle. How many others were there? And how chummy _were _Sharon and Dr. Morales? She had always appreciated the coroner's dry wit and vast intelligence, but had also always felt that he never liked her much. For the briefest of moments, she imagined a scenario wherein Morales and Raydor mocked her behind her back. She bit her thumb. _I bet Sharon even knows his first name_.

"Uh, Chief?"

"Right. Do you have an ETA on my cause of death?"

The man paused for a moment, and Brenda could just imagine how mortified he was. She pictured him in the morgue, hitting his head against one of the steel cabinets.

"I should have something for you within the hour," he replied.

Brenda wondered if he'd have been this accommodating if she had called from her own phone and glanced at Raydor as she re-entered the break room. "Thank you, Doctor. Thank you so much."

They both hesitated for a moment before he ended the call. Brenda stared at the phone for a moment and bit her lip.

"Everything all right?" Sharon asked, plucking the phone from Brenda's fingers and slipping it back into her pocket. "You look as though someone just insulted your mother."

Brenda gave an embarrassed little laugh. "Just, um, a little confusion there. He thought I was you."

Sharon raised an eyebrow. "And?"

The blonde's flushed cheeks were answer enough for the captain, who chuckled. "Ah. I see."

"I didn't realize you two were so...close."

"We're good friends."

Brenda nodded slowly, having decided that it would be best not to say anything for fear of sounding like a jealous seven-year-old. Her tight-lipped response was moot, however, when Sharon immediately recognized the look on her face.

So Brenda was jealous? Sharon found it deliciously flattering.

"Are we still on for furniture shopping this weekend?" the captain asked.

Brenda's awkward smile turned genuine. "Yeah! I'd love to," she replied, perhaps a little too eagerly. She hoped her audience had dissipated; her exclamation would certainly have been overheard by loiterers.

"How's Saturday?"

"I've gotta stop by and feed Joel in the morning, but I could pick you up after?"

"Around 9:30? Give me a call when you're on your way over."

Brenda frowned slightly. "10:30," she countered, and the other woman shook her head grimly.

"No, Brenda. With the amount of work we need to do, 9:30 is pushing it." Sharon headed for the door, but stopped and turned back, looking from her mug to the slender blonde. "And bring me coffee," she specified. "Black, one sugar."

Leaving Brenda shaking her head, she sailed by Flynn and Provenza with a flutter of her fingers. "Bye, boys," she tossed off. "You all have a real nice day."

Sharon Raydor hated to be kept waiting. She'd grounded her children for tardiness. She'd broken up with a man for his lack of punctuality. She'd even fired an officer for repeatedly showing up late to crime scenes. She wondered, as she noticed that it was now 9:51, if she'd be able to maintain a friendship with the least punctual person she knew.

Perhaps it was a habit she could teach the deputy chief to break.

When the honk of the car horn sounded from outside, Sharon took her time gathering her purse and jacket, leaving the other woman waiting for as long as she could stand before even she bristled at her own stalling tactics.

Sharon got into the car, immediately taking note of two crucial facts: firstly, Brenda was not her bright, enthusiastic self and secondly, perhaps more importantly, there were no coffee cups in the console's drink holder. Luckily for Brenda, Sharon had anticipated this and had already had a cup.

"Sorry I'm late," Brenda offered dully, pulling away from the curb before Sharon had even buckled her seatbelt.

The brunette pursed her lips and gave the woman a slow once-over, pondering just how concerned she should be. She remembered that Brenda had obligated herself to taking care of the cat in Agent Howard's absence. Was this what happened when Brenda was separated from her cat, or had something happened to spark this unpleasant mood? "Is everything all right?"

"Oh, sure. Everythin's fine," the blonde replied absently, tapping her thumbs against the steering wheel.

Sharon frowned. "How was Joel?"

"He's fine. Y'know...distant and snooty as ever. He was always more Fritzi's cat than my own."

The captain noticed that the corner of Brenda's mouth twitched into a near-frown at the mention of the man's name. Had he come home early? Left her a note? Was she jealous of the cat's loyalty to his master? "Brenda, you seem upset."

"Huh? No... I'm f-"

"Fine. Yes, so you've said." Sharon sighed. "I'm related to enough passive-aggressive females to know that 'fine' never actually means 'fine.'"

When they reached a red light, Brenda looked at her imploringly. "Really, Sharon. I don't...I'm okay. Really. I just miss my cat, is all."

Sharon sighed, not believing her for a second, and decided not to push it. "All right."

Brenda forced a cheerful smile. "I hope you're ready for this, 'cause I find shoppin' to be really overwhelmin'."

"Should I have brought along a few Xanax?"

That, at least, elicited a laugh. "All those people and sales folk and all the different options..." Brenda shuddered. "I'm glad I don't have to brave all that on my own."

"You do realize it's just a shopping trip, that you're not facing down a firing squad?"

The other woman tipped her head back as her foot pressed down on the accelerator and they shot through the newly-green light. "I'd prefer the firin' squad."

Sharon compressed her lips and gazed out at the Saturday morning traffic, swallowing the urge to sigh again. She'd been looking forward to this, perhaps a little more than she should have been. The captain was both flattered and, frankly, relieved that the deputy chief had requested her assistance; who knew what unimaginable floral-print horror might have lured Brenda Leigh with its siren song otherwise? And Sharon enjoyed shopping. She enjoyed it with the sense of pleased, surprised accomplishment that always accompanied the performance of an activity for which someone had a real aptitude. For Sharon, things that started with 's' seemed to come easily: shopping, skiing, shooting... Sex, as far as she remembered, but it had been a while.

A horn honked sharply and she jerked herself back to the present. The point was that she was a good shopper, with a keen eye for form and material, and a good sense of what an item was actually worth. It pleased her that Brenda Leigh was enlisting her superior skill. She could help the other woman and have a good time while she was at it.

The truth, though, was that if Brenda Leigh had batted her eyelashes and asked nicely, Sharon probably would have agreed to participate in any number of activities, including, but not limited to, re-grouting her bathroom or watching wrestling. It was unexpectedly pleasant - and the tiniest bit thrilling, if Sharon was brutally honest with herself - to have someone, particularly another career-driven woman who was relatively close to her own age, want to spend time with her simply because she enjoyed the captain's company.

It wasn't that Sharon was some sad, friendless hermit, but her whole world had gradually shrunk over the last eleven months. Old friends felt the need to have deep, penetrating conversations about all the feelings they thought Sharon should be feeling "under the circumstances" (as if any of them knew a damn thing about her _circumstances_); and even if work had left her the time to seek out new acquaintances, she couldn't summon the energy. Dating was out of the question.

And then there was Brenda Leigh Johnson, arguing with her over a chocolate bar.

The more she thought about it, the more sense it made for the two of them to be friends. On paper, at least, they had a great deal in common, and the strong animosity they'd initially felt for one another was itself a connection.

Sharon sipped from the travel mug she'd brought with her and surreptitiously surveyed her companion. She didn't think Brenda had changed her mind about having her along. It was more like she'd changed her mind about the entire outing.

As the blonde circled the parking lot, stalking a parking space, the captain briefly considered giving her an out. She could turn to her and say, "Brenda, are you sure you want to do this today? We can reschedule." It was the same impulse of sympathy that had occasionally made her want to say something like, "You know, Vivvy, you don't have to practice your violin if you really don't want to," and she did the same thing now that she'd done then: she ignored it. Vivien had needed the discipline of learning to play the violin; Brenda Leigh needed a new sofa.

The car was barely in park when Sharon sprang out onto the asphalt. "Come on," she said briskly. "Time's a-wasting."

Brenda pulled herself from the car as if she were already on the verge of collapse. Sharon knew the feeling. When the younger woman was fully upright, with her enormous purse slung over her shoulder and the car locked, they set out across the parking lot, and Brenda's gaze finally landed on Sharon's shiny green mug. "Oh, no," she gasped, an expression of dismay pinching her features, "I forgot your coffee!"

Sharon just smiled. "No worries, Brenda Leigh," she responded breezily. "I have some."

Brenda sulked, her generous lips pulling into a full-on pout. "I forgot mine too. I was gonna stop and get us some on the way to your house but..." She sighed. "I forgot."

"If you had done that, you'd have been even more late than you already were." Sharon pressed her mug into Brenda's hand, certain that _something_ had happened during the time after Brenda left her own house and before she arrived at Sharon's. "Drink," she ordered. "I think you need the caffeine more than I do."

The blonde smiled gratefully and appreciated the warmth of the mug's contents radiating through her palm. She stared at the mouthpiece that had only just touched the other woman's lips and felt an inexplicable blush creep over her cheeks. They'd shared a slice of cake together, an act of such intimacy that Brenda _never _indulged in it with other people (not even Fritz, who had known better than to assume he was entitled to half of her sweets). It wasn't that she didn't like to share (which, truth be told, she didn't); for Brenda, sharing was an intimate gesture. It meant surrendering any sense of ownership, allowing someone access to something that didn't belong to them, and enjoying something so much that the only way it could be fully appreciated was to allow someone else to experience it as well.

And yet, for the second time, Sharon had invited her to share, had invited her into her own personal sphere. Perhaps it was this that solidified the reality of their friendship in Brenda's mind. Sharon was comfortable with her, and the force of that realization assuaged a little of the self-doubt that had been plaguing her all morning. She took a long sip before handing the mug back over, undeniably thankful for the slight burn in her throat.

"Thanks, Sharon," Brenda said.

Sharon nodded and directed Brenda inside the store, following closely behind in case Brenda considered making a run for it. The younger woman allowed herself to be guided, brown eyes darting madly between sofas and armchairs of every possible color combination. Sharon nearly laughed at the expression of overwhelmed concern on Brenda's face. "Come on. Let's start over here."

They walked for several minutes, pausing only for Brenda to rub her hand along a suede loveseat and, a moment later, yell "Extortion!" at an overpriced reclining armchair. Sharon observed Brenda the way she had observed her children when released into the wilds of Toys-R-Us. In Sharon's opinion, a great deal could be said about a person based on what they were immediately drawn to on a shopping excursion. Her son had always gone straight for the books, whereas her daughter had tended to drift between the soccer balls and motorized airplanes.

Brenda, on the other hand, seemed completely out of her element. Her shoulders were noticeably drooped and her right hand, which clutched at the strap of her purse where it rested on her shoulder, was tightened into a fist. Sharon pursed her lips. How was she supposed to prove her superior shopping skills if Brenda had checked out before they even began?

"This is nice," the blonde said, coming around the side of a hideous floral-patterned sofa to sit on its bulging cushion.

"No," Sharon declared. "Absolutely not."

Brenda slumped down into the cushions. "Why not?"

"Because it's _ugly_, Brenda Leigh. You can do better than that. I _know_ you have it in you."

"What if I don't?" the younger woman said with a sigh, tracing one of the fluorescent green leaves.

Sharon inhaled deeply and planted her hands on her hips, giving Brenda her most imperious Captain Raydor glare. "What happened at Agent Howard's, Brenda?"

Brenda sat in silence for several moments before finally admitting: "There was a toothbrush."

Sharon furrowed her brow and sat down beside her. "A toothbrush," she repeated. "I would hope that Fritz would have a toothbrush..."

"It wasn't _his,_" Brenda mournfully confessed. "He takes his toothbrush with him when he travels. There shouldn't have been anythin' in the cup but there was. And his toothbrush is always, _always_ green and this one was orange. _Orange!_"

"Oh." It was not a surprised 'oh,' nor an empathetic 'oh'; not even a curious 'oh.' It was just an 'oh.'

"He's seein' somebody," Brenda burst out, half hoping Sharon would argue with her just so she could lay out the irrefutable evidence once again.

"And this is something you haven't discussed," the dark-haired woman instead continued, treading carefully.

Brenda scowled. "The divorce isn't even final yet! Don't you think it's just a _little_ soon to be havin' co-ed slumber parties?"

With effort, Sharon refrained from asking Brenda if she'd be more comfortable if she thought Agent Howard's new partner was a man. "I suppose that depends on the circumstances," she replied as neutrally as she possibly could.

The blonde sniffled, and Sharon felt her spine stiffen. She'd rather be filling out reports in triplicate than spending her Saturday with a soggy near-divorcee. Public displays of emotion made her uncomfortable; she was pretty sure it was genetic (although Danny hadn't inherited the gene).

"What kinda person gets involved with somebody whose wife left him five minutes ago?" Brenda groused, her lip trembling alarmingly. "And before you say it, no, he was not havin' an affair with her. I'm the one who decided to end things. Well, I mean, it was mutual, but I'm the one who brought it up. If I hadn't, everything'd probably still be just like it was."

Sharon paused to contemplate that degree of passivity in a spouse - at least she and Paul had had a few blazing, blow-the-doors-off rows - and then her lip curled in distaste. Until today Brenda Leigh had seemed remarkably free of baggage, and now she was a snivelling mess. This turn of events suggested that the deputy chief was one of those people who just wanted whatever she didn't have - _not_ one of Sharon's preferred character traits.

Even in her own mind the captain thought that sounded harsh. Maybe the unexpected sight of the incriminating toothbrush had just been the jolt Brenda needed to show her what she really wanted, and it was neither a new sofa nor a new girlfriend.

The thought filled Sharon with an ineffable disappointment that channeled itself into irritation. Hot, cold, yes, no: why couldn't people just make up their minds and stick to their decisions? And why did the vast majority of them seem to think you had to be paired up like an animal on the ark for your life to be worth a damn? Sharon was just fine being single, thank you. Was it really too much to ask to have one rational, reasonable, adult female friend who felt the same way? Here Sharon was giving up both her time and her caffeinated beverage to help Brenda - being a good friend, in short - but that counted for nothing in the face of the Great Orange Toothbrush Caper.

Maybe, she reflected, the sex had just been _that_ good. But if Brenda Leigh was to be believed and Agent Howard was really that passive, Sharon found that possibility hard to credit.

"Well, like you said," Sharon put in abruptly, "the ink on the decree is still wet. I'm sure you can probably get your toothbrush back into Agent Howard's cup, so to speak, if that's what you really want." With that she stood, readjusting the shoulder strap of her own, much more modestly-sized handbag.

Brenda blinked up in glassy-eyed confusion. "Who said anythin' about gettin' back together with Fritz?"

"Isn't that why you're upset?"

"Good Lord..._no!_"

Sharon pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'm afraid you're going to have to spell this one out for me, Brenda."

"_Because_!" Brenda wailed petulantly, channelling her inner seven-year-old. "Look...if Fritz is gonna date people, that's his business."

"Why, then, were you snooping in his bathroom?"

"I wasn't snoopin'!" Brenda snipped defensively. "I had to pee and when I was washin' my hands, I saw it. It's not like I was _lookin_' for things. I wasn't pokin' around with a magnifying glass."

"Weren't you?" Sharon countered, finding it difficult to believe that Brenda Leigh Johnson had managed to tame her penchant for sticking her nose in where it didn't belong.

"No! I don't care if Fritz is seein' someone. I mean, the least he could do was wait till the divorce is final or till he moves back to D.C., but it's his own business." Brenda stared wide-eyed at the other woman, wishing that she could just invite Sharon into her brain to impart some order to her thoughts. She knew she was babbling nonsensically. Even she didn't understand why she was being so illogical. As usual, it had only taken one potentially tiny trigger, like the infamous toothbrush, to catapult her headfirst into a string of jumbled thoughts that had been lying dormant and neglected in the back of her mind. "I know this doesn't make any sense."

"No, I'm afraid it doesn't." Sharon looked at the woeful expression on Brenda's face and felt a stab of pity that caused the sting of irritation to ebb away. "You don't want to be with Fritz."

"No," Brenda repeated firmly.

"And you're not jealous of the possibility that he is seeing someone?"

"No. Well, yes. She's probably young and perky and...young." The blonde let out a huff of a breath. "I'm not gettin' any younger, Sharon. All I could think of was how I'm gonna be fifty and a divorcee twice over."

The older woman blinked and relaxed a little into the lumpy sofa, attempting to follow Brenda's convoluted thought process. A toothbrush had made her feel..._old_? She could have laughed if it weren't so ridiculous. However, she supposed that this was a more manageable alternative to Brenda being lovesick over her ex. Perhaps there was hope for Brenda yet. Sharon promptly stood and held out her hand. "Come on. I'd prefer to talk about the joys of ageing on a less abhorrent piece of furniture."

Brenda rolled her eyes and grasped Sharon's hand, squeezing slightly as she allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. She was surprised by how warm the other woman's skin was. "I don't see what's so bad about this one."

"No, Brenda. Just...no." Extracting her hand, Sharon then placed it on the small of Brenda's back and pointed her toward a row of more acceptable choices. As they headed along the aisle, Sharon sighed as if taking in the fresh air. "Don't you feel better already?"

"One day I'm gonna find out what florals ever did to offend you so badly," Brenda threatened.

"Not before I find out why you had a meltdown over a toothbrush."

"It's not the toothbrush. It really isn't. I just stood there lookin' at it like a fool and thinkin' about what my life had become, y'know? I've worked so hard for so long just to end up right back where I started."

"Right back where you started? As a highly intelligent, well-respected member of the law enforcement community - as, in fact, the highest-ranking female member of any major urban police department in the country. Yeah, now I completely see why you're so despondent."

Brenda stopped abruptly. "In the country? Really?"

Sharon nodded.

"Are you sure?"

"It's my job to be sure."

Brenda contemplated this for a second, but refused to be distracted from her pity party. "But that isn't what I mean. The longest relationship I've ever been in just ended, and I'm not even sure why I couldn't make it work. I'm just this pathetic single woman who can barely boil water. I don't have any children. I can barely keep a cactus alive. All my possessions are in cardboard boxes. I have a _futon_ in my living room."

Sharon spun around with her hands on her hips, genuinely annoyed. "Listen to you. Brenda, have you ever had a burning desire to be a mother?"

The younger woman paled and shook her head adamantly.

"And cooking? You _yearn_ to learn to cook?"

Another shake of the head, slightly less adamant.

"Well then, who the hell cares? You're far too intelligent to measure yourself against those standards, and if that's what you want to spend your Saturday doing, go right ahead, but I'm leaving."

She actually took a step, and Brenda lunged out and grabbed her wrist. "Wait, wait. I guess I'm just feelin' a little sorry for myself."

The captain pursed her lips. "Oh, I hadn't noticed."

"Don't be mad. I don't think I could stand it if you got mad at me right now," the blonde wheedled. "I'm just feelin'... vulnerable. It seems so easy for most people, like Fritz, to pick up all the pieces and do the thing with the couple and the family and the nice house with the nice car. I feel like such a mess in comparison. What if I _can't_ do better?"

"What's 'better'?" Sharon retorted, raising her eyebrows. "Is there some objective standard, a yardstick? If there is, I'd like to know about it so I can find out how I measure up after fifty-four years on this planet."

Brenda folded her arms. "You make it sound ridiculous when you say it like that. You make _me_ sound ridiculous."

"Not you; just this conversation. Where's the woman who was so happy to be relaxed and free, to have her own space and be able to come and go as she pleases and eat take-out every night if she wants to?"

The smaller woman released a heavy sigh. "That woman realized her 'own space' is kind of a shit-hole."

The brunette snorted out a laugh. "No, it's a work in progress, as someone told me. So let's make some progress." Sharon airily waved a hand between them. "Look, I don't have any eligible bachelors on speed dial to offer you, but I can teach you the basics of cooking and cactus-care, and you can borrow my son if you really want him. And if you start that bullshit about being 'old' again, I _will_ let you buy one of those ugly-ass floral sofas."

"But then you won't be my friend..."

"No, I won't," Sharon retorted. "I have _some_ standards."

Brenda grinned, feeling a little of the anxiety ease from her shoulders. She'd been silly to get so bent out of shape about all of this, and she'd been even more foolish to think she could hide her melancholy mood from the only woman who had, in such a short span of time, proven to be a better friend than she'd had in decades. Now that she'd heard Sharon's blunt point of view on the matter, she realized all she'd really needed was a swift kick in the backside. It wasn't as painful as she'd expected.

"You'll feel better when you have a proper sofa," Sharon continued, admiring the sleek look of a black leather armchair. She ran the palm of her hand against the cool material.

Brenda scrunched her nose at the couch. "No leather. Fritzi's got a brown leather sofa...I don't want anythin' even remotely close to that. Plus it makes crunchy noises when you move on it. No brown at all."

"Good girl," Sharon praised with a smile, noticing with appreciation that the enthusiasm had returned to the other woman's chocolatey brown eyes.

"What about this one?" Brenda asked, skipping ahead to sit on a beige loveseat with entirely too-thin cushions.

"I thought you said 'no brown'?"

"This isn't brown. It's beige."

"Which is a lighter tone of _brown_."

"Well what's wrong with it? I thought since it's neutral it'll match all sorts of other things..."

"No. No beige. Absolutely not."

Brenda got to her feet. "What did beige ever do to you?"

"It existed," Sharon quipped back.

Brenda dragged her feet along the aisle, heading for a section of black sofas. "Maybe we should go to Sephora later. I'm gonna need to stock up on anti-wrinkle cream after this."

Sharon snorted. "I can only imagine the havoc you'd create in a makeup store."

"Hey! I'm good at makeup! Once I figured out the lipstick thing..."

"That must have been before I knew you."

"Yes, thankfully. I'm sure you'd have mocked me into next week..." She unceremoniously plopped onto a wide black couch, blinking up at Sharon.

"Black's not a smart idea, especially if you ever plan on getting another cat."

Brenda pursed her lips and stood back up. "Why don't _you_ lead the way then, hmm?"

"I thought you'd never ask."

"Since when do you wait for someone to _ask_?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, was that the sound of you giving me _carte blanche_?"

"No!" Brenda exclaimed, drawing herself up to her full height "No, no. Lead on." As the words left her mouth, though, the blonde thought she might have been better off if she'd just left Sharon to her own devices - if only it wouldn't have been so personally humiliating to admit that she could break a hardened criminal in fifteen minutes, but the idea of shopping for a simple item of furniture reduced her to a quivering heap of nerves. Of course, she was pretty sure the captain had already figured that out, toothbrush-induced meltdown aside.

"All right, then, let's approach this differently. When you look at the sofas, try not to see the colors -"

("That's what my mama always taught me," Brenda murmured.)

"- and just focus on the form. Most of these can be covered in a variety of different colors and textures."

"Includin' flowers?" Brenda teased weakly, and Sharon ignored her.

"So have a look around, thinking about size and shape. I'll follow you."

Having Sharon Raydor follow her around a furniture store was slightly less intimidating than having the woman follow her around a crime scene, since at least she didn't have her little notebook with her. At first Brenda felt sure that Sharon had set her an impossible task, but after a few minutes she realized the other woman's advice had made this easier. She was wary of trusting her instincts when it came to color and pattern, but she immediately knew that the ultra-modern designs were too, well, modern; the model with the spindly legs looked like it wouldn't hold a pudgy kitty, much less an actual human; the sectionals were far too big; and anything without arms lost by default. She was left with a manageable pool of options, and she and Sharon walked around, trying them out.

"I feel like I'm in 'The Princess and the Pea,'" Brenda joked, giving a slight, cautious bounce as she sat down on a sturdy sharp-cornered couch.

"Goldilocks," Sharon retorted, settling herself on the other end of the display model. "You look the part. What do you think?"

"Hmm." The deputy chief shifted back and forth. "These cushions at the back could be a little fluffier, couldn't they?"

"Agreed." The brunette stood up quickly. "Next?"

Brenda squinted and pivoted slowly, looking around the showroom with the same eagle-eyed focus she turned on crime scenes. "That one," she decided, pointing (which her mama had told her _not_ to do). Sharon followed the line of her finger toward a vintage-inspired sofa with a gently curving back and art nouveau curves in place of the boxy angles of her previous choice, and her warm smile made Brenda feel like she'd just gotten a gold star from one of her elementary school teachers.

"Ooh, it's all velvety," Brenda cooed, stroking one of the cushions, and then whipped her head around to look at Sharon. "Is that bad?"

The captain chuckled. "Not if you like it."

Brenda had liked the floral prints too, but Sharon wasn't immediately putting the kibosh on this one, so the blonde felt marginally more confident. She flopped down right in the middle of the center cushion and leaned back. "Oo-ooh, it's nice," she enthused in the same birdlike coo. She patted the place beside her. "Come sit."

Sharon sat down with more grace, her knee brushing Brenda's, and nodded with cautious approval.

"It's not too squishy," Brenda said, smiling happily, tiptoeing around the first flushes of infatuation with the sofa that might come to be her very own, aware that she needed to stay in the getting-to-know-you phase for a little while before she allowed herself to fall head-over-heels. "But it's not too firm, either. What do you think?" She looked hopefully at her companion, as if she were bringing a new boyfriend home to meet the family. "It's the right size, isn't it?"

Sharon nodded noncommittally, leaning over to consult the price tag on the booklet of fabric swatches hanging from the arm on her end of the sofa. Brenda Leigh sucked her lower lip into her mouth.

"How much?" she asked fearfully.

The older woman smirked, turning the laminated square of paper to show her. "I think it's reasonable," she said, "and you make a lot more money than I do."

Brenda squinted, trying to make out the tiny numbers on the bottom of the display sheet. Not wanting to dig her glasses out of the bottom of her purse, she leaned over Sharon's denim-clad lap until the blurred figures came into focus. "Oh, that's not as bad as I thought it would be."

Sharon leaned back into the cushion, trying to seek a little space from the woman whose breasts were now pressing into her thighs. She rolled her eyes at Brenda's disregard for her personal space. "I told you," Sharon replied. When the other woman didn't immediately move, she added, "Will you get off me, Brenda?"

"Oh," Brenda said sheepishly, sitting upright. "I was readin' about the delivery options. Sorry."

"Delivery options? You've made your decision?"

"Yes," Brenda said dreamily, burrowing herself back into velvety softness of the sofa. "This is _the one_."

Sharon smirked, watching the woman close her eyes and nestle in as if she were a kitten. "Why Brenda Leigh, back in the saddle so soon?"

"Mmm...nope. I'm off the market now for good."

"You're mixing metaphors."

"So? This is true love...and love don't care if you mix your metaphors."

Sharon chuckled, finding Brenda's bubbly enthusiasm infectious. A slow grin crept over her face and she settled back, allowing herself to consider the possibility of future movie nights on this couch. She closed her eyes and reveled in the fact that yes, she had succeeded, and yes, she would be perfectly content on this particular piece of furniture.

"May I help you, ladies?" came a chipper, high-pitched voice. Brenda jolted, snapping open her eyes to see the perky blonde salesgirl standing, hands clasped, in front of them. She squinted to read the name embossed on the name tag: Amber.

Sharon politely acknowledged the young woman, who looked far too young to be legally working in retail. "I think we've found a keeper."

"You've made an excellent choice," Amber said, her high ponytail bouncing as she collected a small brochure for the specific line of furniture and handed it to Sharon, who passed it to Brenda. "Chenille is a very comfortable, durable fabric. This sofa comes with a one-year warranty and a three-day guaranteed delivery. Also, you'll notice on the second page of your pamphlet that the matching armchair comes at a discounted price if you buy them together."

Brenda pursed her lips. "Is there even _room_ for a matchin' armchair?"

"It would be a tight fit but I think you could manage it," Sharon conceded. "Do you _want_ an armchair?"

"I dunno. I hadn't thought about it. I was too preoccupied by the whole couch affair." Though her apartment was small, it was not her intent _never_ to have company, and she couldn't quite imagine everyone squished together on one couch. "All right, why not?"

"Great!" Amber beamed. "Have you thought of a color?"

Brenda and Sharon exchanged a glance. Brenda looked at the color swatches and, bypassing the black, gray, and beige, was left with only red and olive green. "...Red?"

"Oooh, very daring!" Amber excitedly added, and Sharon rolled her eyes.

"Yeah?" Brenda looked to Sharon for confirmation. "What do you think? Is that too crazy?"

"It's very...you. Nothing says 'screw you, midlife crisis' like a bright red sofa," Sharon said with a smirk.

"I am _not_ havin' a midlife crisis. It was a...moment. A fluke," Brenda retorted, her cheeks flushed. She turned to the salesgirl. "I'll take it."

"I think you two will be very happy with it." Amber's smile widened. "Can I just say that I think it's great that your partner is so supportive of your decorative choices? My mom was never this accommodating with her wife when they were married."

It took a few seconds for Brenda's brain to stutter into action - not because she'd just fallen off the turnip truck, or because she thought women being married to other women was a_ thing_, but because the idea that anyone would just go and assume she was married to the likes of Sharon Raydor was just so utterly...

So utterly... what, exactly? Avoiding Amber's delighted smile (her parents must have spent a fortune on dental work), she risked making eye contact with the captain, as if seeking clarification of her own response. She immediately wished she hadn't looked, because Sharon was sporting her full-on Raydor glare, the one she wore when Brenda crossed her red and black crime-scene tape or ignored her seventy-hour reporting cycle.

No, the deputy chief realized, this expression was even more lethal than that. Sharon looked as if Amber had just convinced Brenda Leigh to buy a whole suite of that floral-print furniture.

For her part, the blonde felt herself doing a slow burn, her cheeks surely the same fetching crimson as the sofa that would soon have pride of place in her living room. "Divorced!" she blurted incongruously. "I'm... divorced."

Sharon rolled her eyes ceilingward, evidently not appeased by her friend's confession.

Amber blinked, utterly oblivious to her mistake. "Oh, then that makes it even nicer that you still get along so well! Will that be cash or credit?"


	4. Chapter 4

**Title: Since You Went Away**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Fandom: Brenda/Sharon,The Closer**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 4249**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Sorry for the wait, y'all. Let us know what you think. Comments shorten the wait between chapters!**

**Chapter Four: Sex and the Single Girl**

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you were really offended." Brenda hoisted the bags containing all sorts of kitchen miscellanea and an entire new set of bath towels (crimson, a color choice that had made Sharon warn, "I appreciate that you have a theme going, but you do know you'll have to wash those separately from everything else, right?") and looked at her companion. The captain stood beside the car, balancing the styrofoam containers that held the salads they'd stopped for at a nearby deli. "By that salesgirl thinkin' we were a couple, I mean."

Sharon's lips thinned. "I _was _offended." Her boots clip-clopped as the two women walked the short distance to Brenda's building.

The blonde looked askance as she entered her code on the keypad just outside the entrance. "Isn't that hypocritical?" When Sharon looked blank she elaborated, "You have a gay son. So do you just dislike lesbians, or -?"

Moss-green eyes rolled toward the overcast sky. "It wouldn't have made any difference if you were a man, Brenda. The assumption was extremely presumptuous."

They crossed the courtyard and trooped up the stairs to Brenda's second-floor entrance as she replied, "I just don't see what the big deal is. Was it because she thought we were married? Your experience soured you on the institution?"

"_No_. But why should the default assumption be that if two people engage in an activity together, any activity, they must be a couple? Aren't we just allowed to have friends anymore? Friendship used to be considered a sacred bond."

Brenda Leigh smothered a smile as she let them into her apartment, which looked exactly the same as it had the last time Sharon had been there-the only difference being an empty soda can on the table. "We were buyin' furniture," the blonde pointed out. "Not havin' our nails done or goin' to the gym. Furniture-buying is something couples usually do together."

"And if you're not part of a couple," the captain continued, dropping her handbag on the floor and gesturing adamantly, nearly upsetting one of the styrofoam containers, "then there must be something wrong with you. You must be lacking or deficient in some essential way. You couldn't possibly be a mature, well-adjusted adult who enjoys being single. Our culture demonizes anyone over the age of thirty who remains unpartnered - over twenty-five if you're a woman. So what if you have friends and family and a career, and pay your taxes and recycle and never so much as get a speeding ticket? It doesn't matter. Americans don't trust you if you're a single woman. It's like being overweight or not believing in God: a crime against the culture. Can you imagine anyone more stigmatized in our day and age than a single, obese atheist?" Sharon finished, smacking the lunch down on the table with such force that the abandoned Diet Coke can fell over. It rolled off the table and into the floor, and the deputy chief could no longer hold back her giggles.

"Are you sayin' you wouldn't date me?" she tittered. "Why, captain, I'll have you know I'm quite the catch."

Sharon scowled and flounced into the kitchen. "Why should I have to date anybody?" she called back. "Do you have anything to drink?"

"There's iced tea in the fridge." Brenda followed her friend and watched her remove two glasses from the cabinet; she herself grabbed the pitcher from the refrigerator. "Don't you date at all, Sharon?"

"Some," the taller woman replied briefly, adding ice to the glasses. Brenda Leigh didn't need to know that her last foray into the dating world had been at least nine months earlier. As soon as the perfectly nice man had asked about her children, Sharon had realized she just didn't have the heart for any of it.

"I'd think you'd get asked a lot."

The captain's answering look was so comically stunned that Brenda almost laughed again.

"I mean, you're beautiful and smart and always so put-together..."

Sharon smiled tightly. "And _so_ popular at work, which, as you might realize, is where I spend most of my time." She poured the tea as she continued, "But you're right. I suppose there are opportunities; I just choose not to take them."

"Doesn't it ever get lonely though, perched all high up on your pedestal with your single woman's manifesto?"

"See," Sharon said, setting down the pitcher before she upended it on the kitchen floor, "that's exactly what I'm saying. You think I'm being superior because I'm not interested in dating. You've been culturally conditioned to believe that there's something wrong with my personal preference."

"That's not what I'm sayin' at all," Brenda immediately interjected, setting out the two salads. "Look, I'm not judgin' you, because I'm not big on the whole datin' thing myself. I just think...well, don't single women have needs too?"

Sharon raised a finely sculpted eyebrow. "I'm perfectly adept at taking care of my own needs, thank you very much." She took up her glass, leaving Brenda's behind on the counter, and sat down at the table.

"I'm sure you are. But isn't it nice when you've got someone else to do it for you sometimes?" She sat down across from Sharon, brandishing two forks.

"I'm _not_ talking about sex with you, Brenda," Sharon warned, pointing at her with her fork.

"Who said anythin' about sex? I was referrin' to programming the DVR!" The brunette blushed, a sight that thoroughly amused the younger woman. "Sorry. I didn't mean to embarrass you."

"I'm not embarrassed," Sharon lied, her eyes firmly fixed on her salad. She picked out several of the undesirable pieces of lettuce that were brown or too limp for her liking and then reached for the packet of balsamic vinaigrette.

"I miss sex sometimes," Brenda wistfully admitted, rolling a cherry tomato around with her fork.

Sharon stabbed at a cucumber and a few pieces of lettuce, firmly adamant about _not_ picturing Brenda Leigh's sexual needs. She wasn't frigid and she wasn't shy, but there were some things that just did not need to be discussed. Discussing sex would inevitably remind Sharon what she _had_ been missing, and that would only make her horny and grumpy. As she chewed her salad, she caught the expectant look on Brenda's face. She swallowed and sighed. "Maybe you just need a better vibrator."

It was the blonde's turn to blush, and Sharon smirked. "I don't have one," Brenda confessed.

"I am _not_ taking you shopping for one."

Brenda snorted. "Does that mean _you_ have one? I bet you do. I'll just bet you're an expert."

The older woman took a large sip of the refreshingly cold tea. "Any items that I may or may not have are my business, not yours."

The deputy chief pouted. "Don't friends talk about this stuff? I bet you and Dr. Morales talk about it."

Sharon couldn't help snorting as she remembered some of the conversations she and the pathologist had had. "Wouldn't you just like to know."

"I would, actually." Brenda pouted harder, but spoiled the effect by grinning. "But I won't pry. Come on, though - If you were lookin' to date somebody, you'd date me, right?"

Sharon speared a chunk of grilled chicken. "Has your ego always needed this much massaging, Brenda Leigh?"

"I didn't think egos were what we were talkin' about gettin' massaged," the blonde pointed out slyly, and Sharon only rolled her eyes.

"If it's that much of an issue, I could make some recommendations."

The deputy chief strangled on a bite of salad that had been doused with a little too much balsamic, and the other woman smirked. "Of vibrators," she elaborated. "Depending on what type you prefer: traditional, egg, g-spot stimulator..."

Brenda squirmed, and Sharon hid an evil grin behind a club cracker. The more uncomfortable the younger woman became, the more confident the captain felt. "You have used one in the past, haven't you? You never struck me as that much of a choirgirl."

"Yes, I have." Brenda blushed furiously as she defended her pride and... worldliness. "I had the personal massager kind." There was that word again. "You know, the ones you can buy at regular stores. The ones that aren't really... _vibrators_."

Sharon shot her a pitying look. "Oh, honey. Of course they are. You buy one of those at Wal-Mart, and you think everyone doesn't know exactly what you're going to do with it when you get home?"

Brenda Leigh pushed a cherry tomato around her tray, squeezing out a trail of seeds. "They have lots of other legitimate uses, Sharon. People with bad backs -"

"Sure." Green eyes flashed as Sharon smiled and sipped her tea; she was enjoying herself now. "Horny women with bad backs."

Brenda considered arguing, but she decided hearing buttoned-up Sharon Raydor utter the word "horny" was its own reward, so she just snickered as she poured more dressing on her salad. "I suppose that's a perfectly legitimate use too," she conceded.

"Amen, sister."

"Why wouldn't you date me?"

The captain shoved a huge bite of salad into her mouth and widened her eyes in exasperation. "Why is this so important to you, Brenda? Did that toothbrush wound your self-esteem _that_ badly?"

"_Nooo,_" Brenda drawled, cringing at the reminder of her little episode. "You're just actin' like I've got the plague or somethin'."

Sharon sighed. "I never said I _wouldn't_ date you, Brenda. If I dated women, which I don't."

"Have you got somethin' against women?"

"Jesus," Sharon exclaimed, setting down her fork. "Fine. If it means that much to you, then _yes_, I would date you. All right? Are you happy now? Can we enjoy our salads in peace?"

Brenda huffed, stabbing a slice of green pepper. "Well now I know that you're just sayin' that to shut me up, so no."

"You know what I think?" Sharon finally said after a moment of careful consideration.

"Hmm?"

"I think," Sharon began, her voice low and slightly deadly, "that you're so worked up about this because _you _want to date _me_."

The blonde gaped. "I do not!"

"See? You don't see me getting all bent out of shape about it."

"I -" Brenda slammed her mouth shut and opened it again. "All right, you win. All you had to say was that I'm not totally unappealin' now in my old age."

"Brenda Leigh," Sharon said levelly, "why does this entirely hypothetical situation matter so much to you?"

The younger woman closed the top of her container over her half-eaten salad. "It's gonna sound silly."

"I think we've passed 'silly' already."

"I need to know that I'm still attractive to people like you."

Sharon knit her brow. "Women?"

"No - people our age who are smart and attractive and goal-oriented and as stubborn as I am. I know you don't care much for the whole companionship thing, but I might eventually get back to that place where I wanna be with someone, and I need a little validation that I'm worth even bein' on the market." She glanced back over Sharon's shoulder, eyeing the open box of ding-dongs on the counter.

"I didn't say that, did I?" Sharon looked genuinely surprised and inquisitive as she took a final bite of her own salad. "I said I enjoy being alone. I didn't say I always want to be alone. Like Garbo, you know." Having followed the other woman's wistful gaze, Sharon got to her feet and walked over to the counter, smiling slightly. Brenda looked blank. "Greta Garbo. After she retired from the screen, she was famously regarded as a recluse. Everyone thinks she said 'I want to be alone.'" Sharon adopted the requisite hint of something that could have passed for a Swedish accent. "But that's a misquote. What she actually said was, 'I want to be _left_ alone.' Vast difference."

"So you just want to be left alone?"

"Something like that," Sharon agreed, fishing a ding-dong from the box and tossing it toward Brenda. It landed on the table with an odd, squishy little thump. "There are parts of my life - parts of me - that would be very hard to explain to anyone else at this point." Her level gaze narrowed and focused on the middle distance, as if she was looking inward. Brenda watched, completely intrigued, until the taller woman visibly shook herself. "Well. Eat your chemically-enriched treat, Brenda Leigh, and then we're getting to work. If you don't unpack those boxes, you won't have room for your scandalous, life-affirming red sofa and matching armchair."

Smiling a little too brightly, Sharon tossed the remains of her salad into the trash can and went into the living room, tea in hand. Brenda's dark eyes followed her. What wasn't Sharon Raydor telling her? The 'parts of her life' she'd referred to could have been her devotion to her job, but that wouldn't explain the look of smothered sadness that had marked her features for that brief moment.

As Brenda peeled back the foil of her snack, she wondered if and when Sharon would ever confide in her those dark details of her life. They had only just become friends and were skirting the margins of what Brenda would have considered _close_ friends, and she decided that she would not jeopardize that just for the sake of satisfying her own curiosity. She got to her feet and sank her teeth into the ding-dong and closed her eyes, humming in pleasure as she blindly shuffled into the living room.

"On second thought, maybe you don't need a vibrator," Sharon observed, latching immediately onto the distraction that Brenda's near-orgasmic indulgence had provided. "No wonder you eat your chocolate in private."

"Not all the time," Brenda replied, dipping her finger into the fluffy cream filling. She sucked it into her mouth. Her eyelashes fluttered. "All right, most of the time."

"And you're comfortable enough with me to flirt with your snacks in front of me. I'm honored."

Brenda crumpled the wrapper and threw it in Sharon's direction. "You should be."

Sharon dodged the foil ball. "I'm not picking that up." She set down her tea on the coffee table and looked at the various stacks of boxes and rubber bins throughout the room, guessing that there were undoubtedly more hidden in the various nooks and crannies of the apartment. "All right, we've established that you don't own any sex toys, which means I shouldn't stumble upon anything embarrassing, right?"

Brenda pursed her lips as if in thought. "Right..."

The captain shook her head in exasperation. "Only you, Brenda."

The blonde beamed as if she'd just received a glowing compliment. "You know you love it."

"Maybe." Sharon reached for the closest box and found it full of miscellaneous bath products, including half-filled bottles of shampoo and wash cloths of assorted colors. She peered back at the other woman who was licking the remnants of chocolate syrup from her fingers. She guessed that, rather than unpack, Brenda had likely just bought all new shampoos and conditioners. "Get a trash bag," she suggested, rolling up her sleeves.

"Why? What're you throwin' away?" Brenda asked, looking over Sharon's shoulder. "All that stuff's still good!"

"You have a whole new set of wash cloths," the brunette countered. "Don't be a pack rat."

Brenda heaved an impatient breath. "_Fine."_

As Brenda disappeared into the kitchen, Sharon heard the chirp of her cell phone. She fetched it from her purse and frowned to see Daniel's name on the caller ID. She'd called him back several days ago, but he had rushed the call under the guise of needing to study and had hung up on her. Not wanting to begin being a neglectful mother after nearly twenty-five years of careful attentiveness, she answered the phone.

"Hey, Mom. You're not at home, are you?"

She frowned. "No, honey, I'm not. Why? Is everything okay?"

"You need to relax," her son chided. "I know it's tough, but you can't expect disaster every time the phone rings."

"I'm a cop," she pointed out, catching Brenda's eye and rolling her own. "When my phone rings it usually means that a disaster has, in fact, happened." Brenda held up a box of Hefty bags and smiled as if she'd won a door prize.

"Ouch, tough crowd. Not when I call, okay? I've just been ringing the doorbell for five minutes, and before I barged in and found mommy _in flagrante_ with her new special friend, I thought I should place a courtesy call. I need to do laundry. The machine in my building is broken again and I don't have any quarters."

"Fine." The brunette lightly rubbed the bridge of her nose and watched Brenda poke through the contents of another box. Daniel was right; if she didn't find a way to stop expecting the worst every time her phone rang, she'd have a stroke. Maybe she needed to sign up for another yoga class. "There's a load of towels in the washer. Please do those as well."

"Your wish is my command." Sharon heard shuffling and scraping, and pictured Danny holding his phone wedged between his jaw and his shoulder as he let himself into the house. "What are you up to?"

"Oh, I'm helping a friend from work."

"Well, do you have a minute? I wanted to ask you a few questions."

The captain blinked. "Yes, I suppose."

"What qualities do you think are most important in a mate?"

"A _mate_?" she echoed incredulously. "Spacious but cozy lair, hunting and gathering abilities -"

"Hah-hah. Fine, a partner. Whatever."

"Is this about you and Kai, sweetie? Has something happened?"

"Come on, Mom. Loyalty, intelligence, humor -?"

"All those things are important, but you can't underestimate the little things. Do you like the same kinds of movies? If he's a vegetarian and you're on the carnivorous side, does he freak out when you order a hamburger? Can you just be quiet and be together without annoying the hell out of each other?"

"Yeah... I don't know what box to check for that."

"Box? Daniel, what on earth -?"

"What about things like religion and smoking?"

"Your mileage may vary - But if you dare take up with a smoking, Evangelical Republican, I will disinherit you."

"Oh, yeah, I'd really hate it if your collection of Joni Mitchell albums went to somebody else. And physically? What do you notice first? Eyes, smile, hair -"

"Package size."

Her response from the other end of the line was stunned silence; Brenda, who was half listening to the other woman's end of the conversation while trying to figure out what all the cords in the box she was emptying could possibly be for, guffawed.

"_Mom!_" Daniel gasped, recovering his ability to speak and breathe.

"I'm trying to think like a twenty-five-year-old guy, babe."

"Please don't. This is not about me. Now, describe your ideal first date."

"Oh, no." At Sharon's low, threatening tone, Brenda Leigh stopped what she was doing and looked up, focusing on her friend's face. "_Ooh_, no. Tell me this is not what I think it is."

"What's wrong?" Brenda asked anxiously, her voice pitched low. Sharon waved her concern away.

"Jesus suffering Christ, Daniel. If I find myself on one of those dating websites -"

"Jesus knows you need some help, Mom, so don't call on him to intervene. Should I put that you're just interested in men, or men and women? Because I think if you expanded your horizons, you might be surprised by -"

"Sharon?" Brenda queried, moving closer, observing her friend's growing pallor.

"... because you're basically describing a gay man, which wouldn't particularly do you any good in this department, or a woman, and -"

"Sharon, honey, are you sure you're okay?"

Daniel swallowed his words in mid-sentence and interrupted himself: "Who is that?"

"No one," Sharon said, cringing immediately as she realized it was exactly the wrong thing to say to her overly imaginative, presumptuous spawn. "Just a friend."

"A _friend_?" Daniel's voice rose in disbelief, and Sharon could clearly picture that his eyebrows had gone with it. "Not the same friend you were with the last time I called?"

Sharon cleared her throat, using a hand on Brenda's hip to distance herself from the other woman. "Yes, that's the one."

"Well well, seems my honorable intentions were a bit premature. Who is she? When do I get to meet her? Can I help pick out the flower arrangements for your commitment ceremony?"

"Daniel," Sharon warned, contemplating banging her head against the nearest hard surface which, incidentally, was _Brenda's _head. She glowered at the hovering woman. "I am not in a relationship."

"_Not_ the same as dating, mother. You're being evasive."

"I am _not_ dating Brenda."

"You see!" Brenda shouted, pointing a wild finger at Sharon. "You've got that tone again! What's so bad about datin' me?"

Daniel snorted. "Don't tell me I'm witnessing the first lovers' quarrel! This is priceless."

"You," Sharon growled, glaring at Brenda, "hush. Go clean something. And as for you, Danny, I am not dating Brenda. Is that clear?"

The blonde curled her lip in distaste. "I wouldn't wanna date someone as horrible as you anyway," she grumbled, pausing to take a sip from Sharon's glass of iced tea before kneeling back on the floor to work through the mass of cords.

"Listen, Mom," Daniel began, his voice taking on a low, serious tone. The hum of the dryer sounded in the background. "You've been to this woman's house twice in one week. You, oh self-anointed hermit extraordinaire, suddenly have a new best friend?"

"Is that so hard to believe?"

"Frankly, yes."

"Well, thank you for that," Sharon spat, dejected. She snapped open a trash bag, causing the blonde to jump, and began throwing in the various bath items.

"Are you upset?"

"What do you think?"

"I apologize. I may have been a little too..._enthusiastic_ about the possibility of you seeing someone. Especially a woman."

"You want your mother to be a lesbian, do you?" Sharon willfully ignored the curious glance of the deputy chief.

"I want you to be _happy_, not a sad old shrew." Knowing he'd pushed his luck, he quickly added, "We'd be a hit at the family reunions. It would be so much nicer not to have to brave them as the only queer in the Raydor clan." He sighed wistfully. "We could have marched in the parade together."

"I've already marched in the parade with you."

"Yeah, but next time _I _could march in the parade with _you_. See what I did there?"

"Fold those towels, son; don't just dump them on top of the dryer."

"All right, I'm dismissed. I get it. You have a nice evening with _Bren-da_. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

"The mind boggles, Daniel, but I don't need details."

"Yeah."

Danny hesitated, breathing into his cell phone, and all of Sharon's maternal instinct went on high alert.

"Why don't you tell me what's really going on?"

"Nothing."

"Daniel -"

"No, really. It's nothing, Mom. We'll talk about it later. Love you. Bye."

Shaking her head, Sharon tossed her phone onto the futon and sighed. For a future mental health professional, she thought it was too bad that her son still had the same disconcerting tendency to go from loquacious to monosyllabic in thirty seconds flat that he'd had since he was six years old. Although, to be fair, over the last nine months they'd both realized that some things were simply better left unsaid.

Brenda chuckled, and the captain welcomed the distraction. "See?" the blonde gloated, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. "It's a sign, Sharon. You're gonna have to start datin'. The universe won't let you be a nun."

"I'm not a nun," Sharon retorted, pulling the lid off a plastic tub at random and finding herself confronting an assortment of mismatched socks. Furtively, before Brenda could catch sight of what she was doing, she grabbed another trash bag. "Nuns aren't allowed to have ten-speed rotating vibrators."

The younger woman flushed a scalded crimson, bit her lip, and fell silent, diligently sorting through a box of cookware, and Sharon smirked to herself. Finally, after nearly three years, she'd found a foolproof way to shut Brenda Leigh Johnson up.

As Sharon began plucking at socks to toss into the garbage, she knew she'd commended herself too prematurely.

"When I finally meet this son of yours, let's hope he doesn't ask me if I think his mama's ready to peruse ... I'd hate to have to tell him that you're already in a committed relationship with The Rabbit."

Sharon glared. "You wouldn't dare."

The blonde smirked and raised a mischievous eyebrow. "Wouldn't I?"

The captain tossed a balled up sock at the younger woman. "I'll remember that when your mother visits."

Brenda gaped, her mouth forming a perfect ring of abject horror. After a moment's consideration, her mouth relaxed into a devious smirk. "Touche, captain." She pulled free a lime green cord that belonged, she believed, to a phone she had thrown away over two years ago. "It's too bad we're not datin' each other. All our problems would be solved."

"Indeed. Now: stop procrastinating, Brenda Leigh. I'm not going to do all the work for you."

"I perfectly capable of doin' my share of the work. Just you wait an' see, Sharon Raydor. I'll surprise you yet."


	5. Chapter 5

**Title: Since You Went Away **

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: T (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 6379**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Authors' Note: We wanted to thank all of you for the wonderful comments you've been leaving. Your kind words mean so much to both of us. As your reward, we present to you the big revelation of Sharon's secret and a heaping helping of angst. Let us know what you think! Enjoy!**

**Chapter Five: The Secret Heart**

Brenda Leigh Johnson was not a sports fan and, after having grown up with three brothers, had learned to tune out all extraneous noise about batting averages and fouls and touchdowns. Nevertheless, it did not take an expert to know that there were far too many teams on the basketball court that morning, all clamoring to get ahead of the game. The crime scene was noisier than usual, swarming with members of Major Crimes, FID, the FBI, paramedics, coroners, and several other black and whites.

With practiced ease, Brenda blocked them all from her peripheral vision and focused instead on the reason why this circus had convened in the first place: the lifeless body at her feet. When Brenda crouched down and gazed into the empty face of Rosalie MacGuire, everything else bled away, leaving her momentarily alone with the victim. Her head was cleared of the frustration of the cluttered crime scene and her worries about the delivery of her sofa faded away, leaving her with enough single-minded clarity to wonder what on earth had happened to lead to this woman being shot twice.

A silently efficient coroner's assistant turned Rosalie onto her side so the deputy chief could survey both bullet wounds: one had entered her chest just above her left breast, while the other had pierced her back in the center of her abdomen. Brenda frowned. Which shot had come first? Had she been shot by one individual, giving her time to turn around before she was shot again? Had it been Officer Reyes, who had arrived at the scene to respond to a call of suspicious behavior? Or had it been Rosalie's partner or, worse, someone else altogether?

From what she had gathered from Sergeant Gabriel and Lieutenant Provenza, Officer Reyes had interrupted a drug deal and was claiming that there had been another woman and a man with Rosalie when shots were fired. He got off three rounds before a bullet grazed his shoulder, Rosalie was hit, and the other two suspects fled the scene.

Brenda let out an exasperated sigh, her mind swarming with questions about the gaping holes in the details of the officer's account of the incident. Though she was inclined to trust one of her boys in blue, she could not shake the hunch that there was more going on than she had been told. Who sold drugs in the middle of an open basketball court in the middle of the morning? And, given that the drugs and money were missing, had Rosalie been selling or buying, or just in the wrong place at the wrong time?

The blonde pursed her lips, eyeing the wounded officer where he sat beside the ambulance, a medic pressing fresh gauze to his injury. She had yet to personally speak to Reyes, having spent her short time at the crime scene being apprised of the details by Gabriel while simultaneously doing her best to thwart the intrusive FBI.

It didn't help that Special Agent Fritz Howard was still the LAPD's liaison, nor did it help that FID had plastered the crime scene with its offending red tape. It wasn't so bad that she had to deal with Fritz (even though she couldn't look at him without wanting to ask how Ms. Orange Toothbrush was doing); the worst part was that Captain Raydor was nowhere to be found.

Though Brenda admittedly preferred _Sharon_ Raydor to _Captain_ Raydor, the blonde just knew that this whole ordeal would be so much more orderly and contained if she were there with her little notepad and superior know-it-all attitude. Sergeant Elliott was probably a perfectly fine detective, but just seeing him blocking all access to the injured officer made Brenda want to stomp her foot and order him to leave.

Lieutenant Provenza peered down at the woman's body. "Sergeant Dingbat over there is insisting that we allow Officer Reyes to go to the hospital before we interview him."

"Absolutely not," Brenda said, allowing Provenza to help her to her feet. "Not till I talk to him." She glanced over at Fritz, who was now edging his way closer to where she needed to be. Elliott, to her dismay, seemed more than willing to cooperate with the FBI.

Brenda narrowed her eyes in their direction. "Where on _earth_ is Captain Raydor?!"

"Not here," Provenza replied helpfully, earning himself a baleful glare from his superior officer. "The Wicked Witch has flown away."

Brenda blew an errant strand of hair from her face, settling her lips into a frown. "That's extremely unhelpful," she snapped. She took a deep breath, and then another. "I wanna know everything there is to know about this girl and Officer Reyes, Lieutenant."

"Already on it."

Brenda nodded and sidled up alongside Lieutenant Tao, who was helpfully directing SID in cataloguing three of the recovered casings. "Have you gotten anything from FID?"

"Nothing solid, Chief," he replied sympathetically. He informed her of the sweep they were doing for the unaccounted-for bullet casings and the perimeter search that was being conducted for the missing suspects, adding that Detective Sanchez was following up with area hospitals and clinics. Gabriel was following up on the 911 call, directing his search efforts at the potential witnesses.

Almost everyone was where they needed to be, working diligently to fit together the pieces of a mismatched puzzle. And yet the scene was pandemonium, because what should have been a well-oiled machine was instead three separate entities working against each other for their own benefit. Brenda knew, just _knew_, that FID would be on her side if Raydor was where she needed her to be. Was the older woman too busy poking her nose into other people's business to attend to her own?

She nodded again as Tao concluded his report, casting another glance in the direction of the ambulance, where the two men were closely huddled around the officer. "Oh, for heaven's sake...this is ridiculous!" she exclaimed, drawing curious stares from Tao and Flynn. She reached into her purse and pulled out her cell phone, dialing the number she'd come to know by heart.

The phone rang twice before Brenda heard the captain's clipped, short tone. "Raydor."

"Captain, why are you not at this crime scene?"

There was a brief pause. "Because, _Chief_, I requested the day off several months ago through the proper channels."

"Whatever it is that you're doin', I need you to wrap it up and get here. I'll have Lieutenant Tao text you the address."

"With all due respect, Chief Johnson, my division is perfectly capable of handling this in my absence."

Had Brenda been listening, she would have caught the despondent lilt to the other woman's voice. However, if she had been listening, she wouldn't have been Brenda. "That wasn't a suggestion, Captain Raydor."

A lengthy silence during which Brenda's impatience mounted ensued, and then: "Yes, Chief."

Brenda wouldn't acknowledge that she'd worked herself into a tizzy by the time the black Accura pulled up forty minutes later, but she did acknowledge that that was what her daddy would've called it. She glimpsed Raydor - that was how she was thinking of her, completely in work mode, as Captain Raydor - in the passenger seat and felt a twinge of relief mingle with the irritation that was coursing through her body.

The twinge disappeared as the other woman remained in the passenger seat, talking with the driver, to whom the deputy chief paid no attention. Rolling her eyes, she ducked under the dual layers of red and yellow crime scene tape and marched over to the vehicle. She yanked the door open and a startled Raydor turned to her, green eyes widening momentarily.

"Well, captain, it certainly took you long enough. You may not have noticed, but this is an active crime scene, and several dozen people are waitin' for you to do your job."

Brenda finally looked at the driver of the car, her gaze magnetized to him by the glare she felt boring into her. That glare was familiar, and it would eventually occur to the blonde that she was making a lacklustre first impression on Sharon's son.

Raydor got out of the car without a word, her own gaze frigid.

"Call me when they release you, Mom," called the young man, confirming Brenda's suspicions. "If it's not too late, I'll bring Cee over to the house."

The captain nodded stiffly, already dragging her attention to the activity before her. "Chief," she began in the cool, dispassionate tone that Brenda Leigh hadn't heard in several weeks, "why is the ambulance still here? Presumably since the paramedics were called, Officer Reyes is in need of medical attention."

"If I let that ambulance leave, between your people and the FBI I'll have to wait through a month of Sundays to ask Reyes any questions that matter."

Sharon didn't blink or bother reacting to the implication that the questions asked in the course of an FID investigation didn't matter. "FID will finish with the officer in question in a timely manner, since we've entered a seventy-two-hour reporting cycle. Obviously I have no control over the FBI - but then, neither do you." Brenda's lips pressed into a grim line as that little jab hit home. "However, in any case, if Reyes's condition is such that it warrants emergency care, any information that could be extracted from him now could hardly be relied upon in court."

Brenda barely refrained from an eye-roll. "I'm quite aware of that, _captain_, but some straight answers, or even some crooked ones, would go a long way toward pointing my investigation in the right direction." That added emphasis on Raydor's rank truly hadn't been intentional, but for heaven's sake, the woman was acting like a bigger pain in the rear than her sergeant over there. "He has a mild concussion and a bullet grazed his arm," the blonde added. "It's not like he's bleedin' out from a severed limb."

Sharon was already walking away, striding steadily toward Fritz, the paramedics, and Elliott. Brenda watched as the older woman spoke to her sergeant, conferred briefly with Fritz, and finally said something to the paramedics. They nodded and began to make unmistakable preparations to leave. Brenda's jaw dropped in indignation and she set out at an undignified trot.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" she cried, signalling imperatively at the paramedics to stop. "What is goin' on here, _captain_?" The emphasis was intentional that time. "Surely you didn't just countermand an order given by a higher-rankin' officer."

Sharon remained as indefatigably calm as ever, but Brenda Leigh noted the minute tightening of the lines bracketing her mouth. She looked tired, the deputy chief involuntarily observed. Tired and preoccupied. "I merely suggested that Officer Reyes be taken to the hospital -" She didn't pause, only raising her voice to remain audible when the blonde began to protest. " - accompanied by one of my people and one of yours, if both you and Agent Howard are amenable to that."

"Oh." Brenda Leigh stopped short, the wind taken out of her sails, as she noticed that Provenza was already in the ambulance with Reyes. "All right. I suppose," she conceded grudgingly, and Fritz gave a sharp nod. She found herself hoping that he had indeed put in for that transfer back East that he'd mentioned to Willie Rae, and that it would come through soon.

Sharon pounded her fist twice against the back of the ambulance, waving the medics off. As they pulled away and turned onto the pothole-filled road, the captain shoved her hands into the pockets of the oversized cardigan she wore in lieu of her usual blazer and turned back to the separated couple. Finding it difficult to look the deputy chief in the face, she focused her attention on Agent Howard. "What is the FBI's interest in this case?"

Fritz's eyebrows twitched momentarily, as if he wanted to raise them and share an incredulous look with his wife before remembering that they were no longer on the same side. Sharon watched as he schooled his features and said, "We believe the victim has connections to a drug cartel we've been monitoring. It's possible that her partner, whom we have yet to identify by name, may have intel that could lead to a significant bust."

Sharon nodded, curling her hands into fists within her pockets. "I see. And the dealer?"

"May be unrelated," Brenda cut in quickly.

"Or may not be," Fritz countered.

Brenda glared at him. "Well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see then, since I wasn't given the chance to properly interview Officer Reyes."

Fritz took a bracing breath. "He was the responding officer, Brenda. He didn't have time for a chat with the suspects before the shooting began. You wouldn't have gotten anything useful from him."

"He may end up forgettin' vital details between now and when I get to talk to him!" She huffed, pointing toward the blood spatter on the asphalt where Rosalie had lain. "For all we know, he may have been involved in this mess somehow!"

"Now you think he's-what? A cop by day, a drug dealer by night?" Fritz retorted.

"Last I checked, it was mornin'."

"That's _enough_," Sharon spat, rubbing her throbbing temple while she stared at the both of them. Her green eyes offered no patience for their bickering. "Let's save the conspiracy theories for later and focus on the _facts_, shall we? Agent Howard, I suggest you follow up on your drug ring while Chief Johnson and I go to the hospital."

"Actually, _captain_, I don't relish the idea of sittin' in a waiting room while our cop gets stitches. We should be at the morgue, where we can actually do somethin' useful." Brenda couldn't hold back the superiority in her tone, feeling the need to assert her own authority over a case which she begrudgingly had to share.

Fritz set his jaw firmly and simply nodded. "I'll follow up with your teams later," he said, finally backing away.

"No need to rush," Brenda muttered under her breath. She looked at Sharon, hoping to catch a sympathetic eye, and saw that the captain was miles away. Her nostrils flared. It was one thing not to have the undivided attention of her friend, but it was quite another not to have the attention of her captain. "I s'pose you'll be needing a ride to the morgue?"

Sharon turned back to Brenda. "Obviously," she drawled.

As they walked to Brenda's car, the deputy chief realized she didn't hear the ubiquitous clack of stiletto heels she'd come to associate with Captain Raydor. She surreptitiously glanced down at the other woman's feet and glimpsed purple ballet flats beneath the cuffs of slim-fitting black denim.

The captain remained silent as they got into the car and fastened their seatbelts, and Brenda pointed them toward police headquarters, the one place in L.A. she could be reliably counted upon to find under any circumstances, from anywhere. After several minutes the stilted silence began to make Brenda uncomfortable, and since she didn't have a ding-dong handy, she resorted to making conversation.

"So you were spendin' the day with your son?" she began brightly. Sharon hummed, still gazing out the passenger-side window at a thoroughly uninteresting stream of traffic. "Special occasion?"

Sharon was silent for long enough that Brenda thought the older woman intended to ignore her; and then she said, so quietly that the sound of her voice was almost drowned out by the sound of wheels spinning on asphalt, "It's his birthday."

"Well, it's nice that he wants to spend it with his mama. How old did you say he is?"

"Twenty-five," Raydor replied in that curiously toneless way she had, not even bothering to look over at Brenda. "Th - _He_ is twenty-five."

So much for conversation, the blonde thought. Very plainly, her passenger was Captain Raydor, not her friend Sharon. Was the other woman always such a bitch when her plans were interrupted by an investigation? She was a career police officer, for heaven's sake. This could hardly be the first time it had happened. And her son was turning twenty-five, not five, so it was highly unlikely that Daniel's balloons were popping and his ice cream cake melting while he wondered why mommy had to work. They could reschedule a lunch or a dinner or whatever it was you did with your adult son to celebrate his birthday.

And if she was totally honest with herself, there was a little part of Brenda that was offended by Sharon's demeanor and her apparent lack of interest in the death of Rosalie MacGuire. Yes, the deputy chief had issued an order to the captain, but underneath the ranks and protocols, hadn't the dark-haired woman heard Brenda Leigh asking her friend Sharon for a favor, for something that mattered?

Though Brenda was loth to admit it to herself, she briefly considered the possibility that perhaps Sharon really didn't care all that much about the victims in her cases. Was it all just a _job_ to her? Senseless deaths, especially of young women and children, always shook the deputy chief down to her very core. Had she misjudged Sharon?

_No,_ she told herself. She recalled how deeply moved Sharon had been by Allie Moore and the victims of other shared cases. Sharon _did_ care as much as Brenda did, but it was obvious that Captain Raydor had left her empathy at home with her stilettos.

As Brenda pulled her car into the parking garage that was woefully far from the building, she found herself feeling undeniably lonely. It didn't matter that Raydor was sitting right beside her; she had hoped to have an ally during this case to help her muddle through the chaos of different departments stepping on everyone's toes. She had also hoped, perhaps a little selfishly, to have someone on her side in her dealings with Fritz. Now that the love between them had been divvied up along with their possessions, only detached antagonism remained. Had it really been that hard for Captain Raydor to have her back?

She parked in her designated space and had barely cut the ignition before Sharon was whipping off her seatbelt and getting out of the car.

Brenda nearly growled in frustration. That woman was going to drive her straight to the loony bin.

"Where's the fire?" Brenda called out, slamming her door shut as she hustled to catch up with the captain.

"I'd rather not waste time, Chief. I'd prefer not to be here all day."

Brenda watched as the older woman tucked her hands once more into her pockets. "I don't wanna be here all day either... There's the rub, I guess, when you sign your life away to the LAPD."

"I give more of myself to this career than most people, Chief," Sharon said, her hair blowing across her face as she strolled briskly down the sidewalk. She shook her head, sending her hair back over her shoulder. "I don't believe I was reaching for the stars by expecting _one_ personal day."

Brenda sighed. "I needed you here," she explained, as if it were as simple as that. "I'm sorry that it just happened to be on your day off. I'll tell the victim that she should've died tomorrow instead."

Sharon pursed her lips, and Brenda could tell that she was trying to suppress whatever comeback had popped into her head. She wanted to know what was so pressing about this one day that had her all in a tizzy, but they were entering the building and stalking toward an elevator and Brenda knew that the other woman wouldn't give her a proper response anyway. They rode in silence until they reached their floor, where they slipped into blue smocks.

Sharon tugged the door open, Brenda close behind. The smaller woman couldn't help but shudder; no matter how many times she'd been in this morgue, she could never quite get used to the cold, sterile scent of death.

Dr. Morales glanced up as they entered, his forehead creasing beneath his cap. "Sharon? What are you doing here today?"

Sharon simply glared in response.

_Oh, great_, Brenda thought, curling her fingers into her palms. Of course Sharon's good buddy Morales would react as if Brenda were the Wicked Witch of the South. Heaven forbid that she ask a fellow officer to interrupt her leisure time in order to _do her job_.

There were some pretty obvious parallels to be drawn there between the deputy chief's current situation and the reception the head of FID faced on a daily basis, but Brenda was in no mood to draw them. She watched from the corner of her eye as the captain snapped on a pair of latex gloves. The improbably attractive pathologist was eying the older woman with disproportionate concern, which only sparked the chief's ire. It wasn't as if Brenda Leigh had just shot Sharon's dog.

The blonde forced herself to relax her fingers and asked, "So, COD?"

Morales blinked balefully and looked down at the sheet-draped form on the stainless-steel table. "I haven't had time to perform a complete autopsy yet, Chief Johnson. But in a pinch I'd go with the two large-caliber bullet holes in the victim's chest and torso."

Mocha-colored eyes narrowed. Brenda found herself wishing she'd brought one of her boys along. She didn't like this feeling of being outnumbered, ganged up on. What was this, high school? "Specifically which one was the kill shot, doctor?"

Getting down to business, Morales turned the sheet back to reveal the young woman's pale corpse, its flesh tinged the unnatural blue and pale green that spoke only of death. "Again, I'm not one hundred percent yet, but I think the shot to the abdomen is the one that killed her. The bullet ripped through a portion of her large intestine and her spleen. She would've bled out very quickly."

"Crime scene was a blood bath," Brenda agreed briefly. "Can you tell which was fired first?"

"Again, I can't be -"

Uncharacteristically, Sharon interrupted. "Educated guess," she muttered flatly, as if she were too tired to give her voice any inflection.

"From the trajectory of the entry wounds, she was shot to the upper left quadrant of the chest -" Brenda barely contained a wince as the young doctor produced a pair of the slender metal rods all pathologists used to measure the trajectory of gunshot wounds, the ones that had seriously dampened the blonde's fondness for anything cooked on a skewer, and inserted one into the victim's chest as if she were a giant hunk of meat. "It winged her collarbone, but missed any vital organs, so it wouldn't have been fatal. You can see how the force of the shot spun her around as she began to fall, which is why the shot to her back looks as if it was fired from a slightly higher angle and more to the left."

"So there were definitely two shooters. Not only were they standing roughly opposite one another, but these wounds were caused by different caliber bullets, right?" Morales nodded, and Captain Raydor added, "Which corroborates the statement Officer Reyes made at the scene."

"Who fired which shot?" the chief asked quickly, something still niggling at her consciousness.

Morales touched Rosalie's abdomen with a gloved index finger. "I've already sent the bullets to ballistics for confirmation, but I can tell you now that this one matches a round fired from a standard-issue service weapon."

Brenda Leigh's eyes narrowed further. "So Officer Reyes fired the kill shot, and he did it after Rosalie had already been shot by our other unidentified assailant?"

"Shit," Sharon grumbled, reaching up to rub at the bridge of her nose, and Brenda whipped around to eye her in surprise.

"Is that your professional opinion?" the deputy chief shot back, but her attempt at humor made no impression.

Before anyone could say anything else, Brenda's phone vibrated. She turned away slightly to answer.

"Chief," said Gabriel, "Officer Reyes has been cleared to talk to us, but we have a small problem. We can't find the statement he gave initially at the scene."

"What do you mean, you can't _find_ it?" Brenda asked sharply, turning back toward an expectant Raydor and arching her eyebrows.

"Sergeant Klein from FID is here at the hospital with Julio and me, but he doesn't have it -"

"No, he wouldn't," the deputy chief replied with studied patience. "The incident commander should have it."

"Right. That's you," Gabriel pointed out meekly.

"No; the FID incident commander." The blonde fought down an eye-roll. "Sergeant Everett."

"Elliott," Gabriel and Raydor corrected in unison.

"Whatever. He has it."

"Ah, no ma'am, he doesn't."

"He _lost_ it?" she squawked, her eyes bugging alarmingly, ready to tear into Sharon about the incompetence of her people.

"No, he didn't lose it," Gabriel replied in that smooth, patient tone that made Brenda think he would've made an excellent elementary school teacher. "He gave it to Captain Raydor when she relieved him. She must have it with her."

Brenda Leigh swallowed a curse. Was nothing going to go right with this investigation? "So have Reyes give another one," she suggested facetiously, but of course Gabriel took his boss's response at face value.

"Um, that's sort of... illegal."

Even if it weren't, it would be pointless, since it would just give Reyes the opportunity to make any changes he might desire to his original version of events. And given the gaping bullet hole in Rosalie MacGuire's stomach that she'd just been examining, Brenda suspected he just might have that desire. "Just a minute." Muffling her phone against her scrub top, the blonde scowled at the brunette captain. "You have Officer Reyes's statement. Gabriel and Sanchez, not to mention your Sergeant Klein, can't question him without it," she said tautly, the little patience she'd had left having evaporated.

Sharon blinked. "Oh," she said after a few seconds, and Brenda could see the wheels turning in her head. "Oh, right. Oops."

Brenda Leigh's jaw dropped as if it had come unhinged. "'Oops'?" she repeated incredulously. "'_Oops_,' Sharon?"

"I forgot," she said faintly. "I was distracted."

"From the looks of it, you're still distracted," the younger woman pointed out none too charitably. "Look, I know this afternoon isn't turnin' out exactly how you had it planned, but what's goin' on in your personal life really isn't relevant at the moment. We have a dead woman right here in front of us -" Brenda punctuated the statement by gesturing emphatically at the body between them, wanting Sharon to see the form as a human being whose life had been stolen from her, whatever the circumstances of her death. " - And an officer of the LAPD whose career could very well be over. I can't handle two investigations by myself, especially not with the FBI nippin' at my heels. You need to get your head in the game, _captain_."

Sharon stared blankly at Brenda and, for a brief moment, Brenda wondered if she'd even been listening. And then, for just a split second, something odd happened. Sharon's mouth tightened, her eyes took on a glassy sheen, and she looked as if she were going to burst into tears. Then her eyes cleared and the captain gave a terse nod and pulled off her gloves with a snap. "My apologies, Chief. I wasn't aware that my performance was failing to live up to your expectations." She cleared her throat, throwing a quick glance at Morales. "If you'll excuse me, I'm going to arrange a ride to the hospital and personally deliver this statement."

Brenda refrained from rolling her eyes at Sharon's sarcastic drawl. "Maybe, if it's not too much of an imposition, you can handle the interview yourself?"

"Whatever you say, Chief Johnson."

Before Brenda could say anything else, the older woman shoved open the door and disappeared. Brenda could hear the slam of the trash bin in the hall, into which the captain had tossed her smock. She sighed, turning back to Rosalie's body. She eyed a tattoo, some sort of Chinese symbol, on the woman's ankle and mumbled, "I hate havin' to be the bad guy."

"Could've fooled me," Morales quipped, snapping several photos of the gunshot wounds.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Brenda replied, perching her hands on her hips. Was this 'gang up on Brenda day'? Had she missed the memo?

"It means, Chief, that you seem to enjoy being unnecessarily harsh with people."

The deputy chief gawked. "I do _not!_ And I wasn't being harsh. I was doin' my job, which is what she should've been doin' too."

The doctor rolled his eyes. "You called her in, didn't you?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but yes. She's the most qualified person in her division. I needed her expertise."

"Is that supposed to be some sort of compliment? Did it not occur to you that she might have an actual _reason_ for not working today?"

"Her son's birthday. I heard. It's just a birthday. They can celebrate tonight, just like everyone else in this line of work who has kids."

Morales laughed incredulously. "Honestly...she calls you her _friend_?"

"I _am_ her friend," she shot back, a touch more hostile than she originally intended.

"Then act like it, Chief. She could use one today, not a boss riding her ass. Considering what she's going through with her daughter, you could give her a break."

Brenda opened her mouth to respond but stopped herself, confused. "What're you talkin' about? Today is her son's birthday. What does that have to do with..." She trailed off helplessly, suddenly embarrassed by Morales's superior knowledge of Sharon's personal life as she realized she couldn't even remember Sharon's daughter's name. She'd only heard the captain mention it once, after all, although she talked about Daniel frequently.

The doctor's attention was finally diverted from Rosalie's body. He lowered the camera to his side and stared at the chief with obvious surprise. "Vivien," he supplied. "It's her birthday as well, you know. That typically happens in the case of twins."

Swallowing, Brenda looked back at the Chinese symbol. It made about as much sense to her as this conversation. "Captain Raydor has twins?" she asked in a small voice.

"You're actually serious, aren't you?" Morales had begun to look sympathetic, almost pitying, as he surveyed the chief. "She hasn't told you anything."

That stung more than Brenda wanted to admit, especially since Sharon obviously had told Morales... whatever there was to tell. "We haven't discussed any situation with her daughter," she replied stiffly, with dignity.

"She -" He stopped, crossed his arms, and leaned back against the door of one of the morgue's refrigerated compartments. When he spoke again, his tone was formal. "Chief Johnson, I'm sure Captain Raydor would have let you know about the situation with Vivien if she felt that it was affecting her work in any way."

"No." Surprising herself, Brenda leaned over and grabbed the man's forearm. "No, don't do that. Whatever you think, Sharon _is_ my friend. What's goin' on?"

"Look...if she didn't tell you, maybe it's not my place."

"If you're gonna be like that, I can play the boss card. It _is_ affectin' her work."

"I know this may be difficult for you to grasp, Chief, but I don't work for you. I work for the county. You can't order me to tell you anything."

Brenda twisted her mouth and bit the inside of her cheek, staring down at his shoes. "I'm not...orderin' you to do anythin'. I obviously screwed up. I'm askin' as her friend for you to please tell me what's goin' on."

Morales sighed, looking at Brenda with a hopeless expression on his face. Brenda met his gaze, staring him down until he slumped his shoulders in submission. "Vivien's in the Air Force."

"Okay." The blonde quirked an eyebrow. "What aren't you tellin' me?"

"Chief-"

"Doctor."

He looked away from her and quietly said, "She's M.I.A."

Brenda stared. Missing in action. The words sent a chill down her spine. She was silent for several beats, and then her questions rushed out, tumbling over one another to pass her lips. "What? She - for how long? Where was she stationed? What happened?"

The doctor held up his hands and pushed himself off the cabinet, taking up his camera to photograph the scratches on the victim's head. "That's all you need to know, Chief. If I were you, I wouldn't push this with her. She doesn't like to talk about it. Surely even _you _can understand that?"

"Of course," Brenda replied, bristling at his tone. "I...thank you, Doctor." She licked her lips and looked back down at Rosalie. The young woman was nearly twenty-six, according to the driver's license that had been recovered at the scene. Had seeing her lifeless body reminded Sharon of her own daughter? She had a hundred questions and knew that she wouldn't get anything else out of the pathologist. "Right. Can you do a tox screen on the body? I'd like to know if she was usin' whatever she was dealin'."

"Will do."

Brenda nodded her thanks and drifted out into the hall. The trash can was partially open, the captain's scrub top hanging over the side.

Brenda knew that she was somewhat single-minded when it came to her job, but she marveled at her blatant inability to see that Sharon, her friend, had been dealing with something greater than the job today. It stung to know that the other woman had refrained from confiding in her. What else had Sharon been hiding? What sort of friend was Brenda if she couldn't be trusted with such a huge part of her life?

Pushing the disquieting thoughts aside, Brenda resolved to do what she did best: get to the bottom of things. She took the elevator straight up to Major Crimes, barely pausing to say a word to the scattered members of her team, and closed herself into her office. She sat down at her desk, grabbed a Snickers, jostled the mouse to wake her sleeping computer, and a few quick keystrokes later, she was viewing the personnel file of one Sharon Raydor.

As a deputy chief, Brenda had access to the jackets of all lower ranking officers - a privilege she had never abused until now, when it was really necessary. And that wasn't abuse at all, she reasoned. She skipped over Sharon's background details, because reading all that would be like cheating on a friendship test, and zeroed in on a single item: the full names of Sharon's children. Daniel Edward Tate and Vivien Raydor Tate. (Interesting that only one of the twins had Sharon's surname as a middle name, Brenda thought briefly as she picked up her cell phone and scrolled through her contacts. There had to be a story there. She imagined Sharon and her faceless ex-husband battling it out in the delivery room.)

Deputy Chief Johnson still knew people at the CIA, and the people at the CIA knew everyone, so less than ten minutes later she was reading First Lieutenant Vivien R. Tate's official air force service record, from graduating second in her class at Colorado Springs to the recon mission she'd been flying a brief two and a half years later over the foothills of Afghanistan in a remote, Taliban-heavy region abutting neighboring Pakistan, when her plane had been shot down. And then... well, and then nothing, as far as the U.S. Air Force was concerned.

Brenda stared at the blinking cursor amid the words on her screen in clear black and white until her eyes glazed over. Nine months; Vivien had been shot down nine months ago. She tried to think back, to remember if she had seen Sharon around that time, if the captain had behaved differently, if she had noticed anything at all out of the ordinary about the other woman. But Brenda's mind furnished only precise details of the cases she'd been working early in the summer, of the frenzied activity surrounding the civil suit that had threatened her and the entire department. She heard Sharon's Captain Raydor voice, speaking carefully and with unwonted gentleness, insisting, "Chief, _hire an attorney_." That was, she realized, around the time she'd become aware that the clever, rule-bound, green-eyed captain wasn't just going through the motions of her job, but was actually concerned about her. Under the circumstances, how in the world had Sharon had any compassion left to spare for Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson, a perpetual thorn in her side, who had made her own bed and, by all rights, should have been forced to lie in it?

Without thinking it through, Brenda dialed Sharon's cell number. The call went straight to voicemail, which made perfect sense if Sharon was at the hospital with Reyes and co. She was just the type to actually turn her phone off. Brenda sighed, slightly relieved. What on earth would she have said? "Hey, Sharon, Dr. Morales has just told me how your daughter's probably dead and today's her birthday, so why don't you just go on home now? Sorry about the misunderstanding!" Hardly.

A sharp rap sounded on her office door and Brenda looked up as Flynn stuck his head in. "Chief, no word yet on our first shooter, but Provenza and Tao are still canvassing. The good news is that Monica Stern, the other woman with Rosalie MacGuire this morning, is in interview two."

The blonde nodded quickly. "Thank you, lieutenant. I needed some good news." She removed her reading glasses, forcing her thoughts back to the case at hand. "I'll be right there. It'll do her good to make her wait for a few minutes." A young woman was dead, and it was Brenda's job to find out exactly why; she owed it to the victim to be fully present in the moment.

Doing whatever she could to make up to Sharon for this awful day would have to wait until later.


	6. Chapter 6

Title: Since You Went Away  
Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie  
Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)  
Word Count: 3476  
Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.

_Authors' Note: Did we scare y'all off with that last angst-ridden chapter, or does this fandom only respond well to chapters that include references to sex toys? In this gripping next installment, Brenda attempts to make it up to Sharon. (Still no vibrators.) Will write for feedback._

-**Chapter Six: In This Our Life**

Under normal circumstances, when Brenda Leigh made a break in her case, she would take that insight and work well into the night to search for the missing pieces. She'd typically be thrumming with the knowledge that she'd be closing her case within a day or two and gearing herself up for a fight with another division or FID or the FBI over the legal custody of the remaining suspects. After speaking with Monica Stern, it became clear to Brenda that the FBI's cartel was not involved. Monica and Rosalie were not involved with the big fish, instead supplying low-key dealers. If Monica had been telling the truth, which Brenda suspected she was, one particular dealer had been stiffing them with his payments and had threatened them if they stopped supplying him or expected full payments. He had not anticipated that Rosalie would become spooked and tip off the police herself.

These, however, were not normal circumstances. During her interview with the young woman, Sanchez and Flynn had rounded up the dealer, Big JJ, and Brenda had instructed them to leave him in holding overnight. She would interview him and Officer Reyes in the morning. There were many unanswered questions, but Brenda was uncharacteristically satisfied to wait a few hours.

No one had been as surprised as Brenda herself when she dismissed them all at a decent hour. She couldn't shake the haunted, sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach whenever her mind drifted to the photo she'd seen of Sharon's daughter. She was beautiful, her face somewhat severe, her emerald eyes hard and unyielding. She was her mother in miniature, and she was lost.

Brenda drove to the nearest grocery store and bumped her car into a stray grocery cart as she pulled into an empty space. She swore under her breath and stalked inside the crowded market, grabbing herself a basket. She looked around, feeling overwhelmed and lost and completely at a disadvantage.

How could she possibly make it up to Sharon? She knew that "I'm sorry, I didn't know" wouldn't cut it but felt panicked and slightly unhinged at the knowledge that she had no idea what would communicate what simple words could not. What did Sharon turn to when she was down? Candy? Booze? Kleenex?

If one thing was clear to Brenda, it was that Sharon obviously didn't turn to her friends. The realization shouldn't have surprised her; Sharon had always been guarded and distant, her personal life remaining elusive until Brenda had made the effort to seek it out. It had been Sharon's job for years to muddle through other people's problems and fix the things that were wrong, but what had she done when her own problems arose? She had compartmentalized, had dealt with it all on her own. So often had Brenda been the one that needed help that she never considered the possibility that someone else might have been silently hoping for the same thing.

Brenda weaved past a horde of disgruntled shoppers and made her way to the brightly lit corner of the store that housed the flowers. She had no idea what Sharon liked. Was she fond of lilies or roses? No-those wouldn't do. She pursed her lips and sifted through memories of her mother's early days of avid gardening, remembering that carnations symbolized pride and roses symbolized love and daffodils symbolized joy and daisies symbolized innocence. She frowned, knowing that none of these would suit her purposes.

Scanning the shelves, Brenda nearly missed the pot of blue hyacinths that was all but hidden behind an ornate sunflower arrangement. She vaguely remembered being told by her mother that hyacinths meant sincerity, and Brenda placed the flowers in her basket. She wondered if Sharon would even know the meaning of the flowers and decided to risk it, hoping that she at least liked the color blue.

Brenda continued her pursuit of the perfect apology gift, adding a bottle of Cabernet and seven bars of Sharon's favorite dark chocolate to her basket.

Said basket was half filled with a seemingly random but carefully-slash-desperately chosen assemblage of goods when she stopped short, staring at the Ben and Jerry's section of the ice cream freezer. She imagined herself greeting Sharon and presenting the frozen treat: "I heard about your daughter. Here's some Half-Baked." The incongruity was such that it made her bark out a laugh and her eyes stung. The truth was that she could stay here in this supermarket until kingdom come and she'd never hit upon the right thing to give to Sharon, or to do for her or say to her, because there was no right thing. The whole situation was horrible and wrong, and whatever she did would be totally inadequate, but she had to go over to Sharon's tonight and apologize or she wouldn't be able to live with herself.

She paid for everything she'd gathered and drove straight to the captain's house before she could lose her nerve - not a problem she had in professional situations, but this was anything other than professional. This wasn't Deputy Chief Johnson paying a visit to Captain Raydor.

Warm yellow light spilled from Sharon's living room window, and Daniel's Accura was parked next to Sharon's familiar car. One of the curtains at the window rustled. Well, no use stalling, since her presence had already been observed.

She rang the doorbell, and a tread heavier than Sharon's made the wood floor of the entryway squeak almost immediately. The door opened and Brenda found herself looking up into eyes darker than Sharon's. "Yes?" Daniel asked formally, unsmiling.

"Daniel, who - Oh." Sharon appeared behind her son in the doorway to the living room, and when Brenda saw her she felt her eyes widen hugely.

"Chief," Sharon continued calmly, "this is my son, Daniel Tate. Danny, Deputy Chief Brenda Johnson."

Daniel wheeled sharply toward his mother. "Bre - this is Brenda? With friends like these, who needs -"

"Daniel was just going. Here, honey - I don't think she'll wake up. She's exhausted." The captain expertly transferred her astonishing burden, a sleeping toddler of whom all Brenda could see was olive skin and unruly dark curls, to her son's waiting shoulder.

Daniel hesitated, his gaze ricocheting between the two women. "She's fine here, Mom. I'm not in any hurry."

Sharon smiled softly, and Brenda recognized her mom face again. The younger woman realized Daniel was intent on protecting his mother. The idea of Sharon Raydor needing protection - and from her! - was so unexpected and sweet that it made the blonde smile too, even as it made her more ashamed of herself.

"Take her home to her own bed, and then you go home and get a good night's sleep too." Sharon leaned up to kiss her son on the cheek, forcing him out the door past Brenda in the process. He cast one last watchful, suspicious look at the chief, readjusted the sleeping child, and finally walked to his car. Green eyes turned to Brenda. "Come in," Sharon invited quietly. "I'm glad you dropped by."

The smaller woman perked up slightly as she followed Sharon into the living room. "You are?" she asked, hopeful.

Dark hair shimmered as Sharon bent to collect the toddler toys scattered across the colorful rag rug. "Yes, chief. I owe you an apology," she declared, not quite meeting Brenda's eyes. "My behavior this morning was unprofessional. You were right: I was unfocused, and as a result the investigation suffered. For that I -"

"No, no. For heaven's sake, stop," Brenda Leigh interrupted rather frantically. Between Daniel's hostility and Sharon's stubborn insistence on apologizing for being human, this visit of conciliation was not off to a good start. She grabbed the taller woman's arm, attracting her clear gaze. "Sharon, stop this. I came over here to apologize to you."

She watched green eyes darken slightly as Sharon considered what this meant, digesting what she must've suspected since she saw Brenda standing there. Sharon's tongue peeped out to moisten her lips. "Why?"

"Because I didn't know," Brenda replied simply.

"No, I know. You didn't." Sharon's eyes dropped to one of the large, brightly colored blocks she'd scooped awkwardly to her chest. Neither of them said anything for a moment. Somewhere a clock ticked. "I'm sorry Daniel was rude to you."

"He's got a lot on his mind." She hesitated. "I don't guess he wants you to date me any more," she added rather sadly, and to her surprise Sharon laughed shortly.

"What's in the bag?" the captain asked, gesturing toward the shopping bag Brenda had almost forgotten she was carrying.

"Oh." The blonde peeked into the bag as if its contents might have changed. "A bunch of useless junk," she admitted shyly. "I wanted to bring you something, but I didn't know - I don't know what to - Sharon, I'm so sorry."

Sharon nodded and didn't say anything. She blinked rapidly, and it occurred to Brenda that maybe she couldn't say anything right then. The words and everything behind them hung between the two women.

"I feel like a horrible friend."

"No," Sharon disagreed, recovering herself and reaching for the bag. "A horrible friend wouldn't have brought me one, two, three - six bars of chocolate. And what's this?" Her forehead crinkled as she frowned and poked at something with her finger. "Macaroni and cheese?"

Brenda blushed. "Oh, that's for me. And there are seven bars of chocolate."

This time a tiny bit of suspicious moisture made its way beyond Sharon's thick eyelashes, but even as she wiped it away with one knuckle, she chuckled. "Thank you, Brenda."

"You can keep the mac and cheese if you want it."

"I might take you up on that." Sharon's smile faded and she looked away, staring into space. "I don't talk about it."

"I understand."

"It's - It isn't an effort to be secretive. There's never a good time to bring it up, you know?"

Brenda nodded, trying to imagine. "You could have told me."

"I would have, eventually. Daniel says we don't talk about it because discussing it would make it real." She lifted her shoulders in a sad little shrug, aware that neither of them had actually spoken Vivien's name. "Maybe that's part of it. I don't know."

"And, uh, the little girl?" Brenda pointed to the toys as if Sharon might need a visual aid.

The older woman brightened immediately. "My granddaughter, Clarissa."

"Your grand -?" Brenda shook her head in dismay. "Morales was right. I really don't know anything about you, do I?"

Sharon gave a sympathetic smile and set the brown paper bag on the coffee table, taking a moment to scoop up the remaining toys and deposit them in the chest beneath the window. "You know more about me than most people do, Brenda Leigh. It's not personal. I wasn't...purposely hiding anything from you. It's just not something we talk about."

Brenda nodded. Who was she to judge Sharon's evasive tactics when she herself was a master at avoiding topics she didn't want to acknowledge? "Guess I need to start askin' better questions," Brenda added lamely, taking a seat on the sofa. She shifted, pulling out a stuffed penguin from between the cushions, and set it on the coffee table.

"What else is in the bag?" Sharon asked, pointing at the bag as she put away the stuffed animal.

"All sorts of things," Brenda said, reaching in. She began extracting its contents, piling the candy bars and pasta beside the wine. She set out the ice cream (which she couldn't not buy, because who could say no to brownie chunks and cookie dough?), a box of tissues, a bag of organic trail mix, and the flowers. "I didn't know what you liked, so I got everything."

Sharon laughed, her smile easing the anxiety in Brenda's belly. "So I see."

"I hope you like hyacinths," Brenda added, glancing down at the fragrant bouquet.

The captain's eyes settled on the blue flowers. She stepped closer, kneeling on the floor so that she could inhale their scent. "Mmm...they're beautiful." She traced the outline of a petal, her eyes closed as she breathed deeper.

The blonde preened. "My mama...she had this garden-oh it was gorgeous-and she'd have me out there with her every afternoon when I got home from school, turnin' the soil and plantin' bulbs and pullin' weeds. She used to say that it was best to grow all sorts of flowers so she'd always have the right kind for every occasion. She used to tell me what all the flowers meant, y'know, what they symbolized. I don't think most people knew just why she chose tulips over peonies, or daisies over sunflowers, but they always got the right ones."

"And what do hyacinths mean?" the brunette asked, catching the wistful expression on Brenda's face.

"They mean..." She cleared her throat. "They mean 'I'm sorry for bein' an insensitive bitch today'."

Sharon let out a bark of laughter, covering her mouth as if surprised that such a sound had come from it. "You sure know how to make a statement."

"I try. Now...d'you want me to put the ice cream away? I'd hate for my apologetic gesture to make a mess."

Sharon rounded the coffee table and slumped down onto the sofa. "Why don't you get us a couple of spoons?"

The blonde grinned and leapt to her feet, disappearing into the kitchen. Sharon didn't watch her go; she propped her elbow on the arm of the sofa and rested her head in her hand, taking a moment to close her eyes. She exhaled slowly and found that she was glad that Brenda had stopped by. She hadn't required the plethora of goodies, but Sharon knew that Brenda had indeed been trying to make a gesture. It had been too long since Sharon had a girlfriend with whom she could share her woes, and it was obvious that Brenda was in the same position.

On some level, which Sharon would never admit, she had been thankful for the distraction of work. It had been difficult with Danny, who had wanted to spend the day commemorating his sister with anecdotes and what-if possibilities. She couldn't blame him for wanting to talk about it; he was, after all, going to be making a living talking about people's problems. As much as Sharon wanted to support her son's need to discuss the disappearance of his twin sister, she had felt more and more imprisoned by her own grief and guilt. Playing 'good cop, bad cop' with Brenda had been a refreshing, though difficult, reprieve.

Sharon opened her eyes when Brenda walked back into the room, holding out one of the spoons. She kicked off her heels and settled down beside Sharon, reaching forward to grab the pint of Half-Baked. She gnawed away the plastic barrier and opened the container, allowing Sharon to take the first bite.

There was a reason why ice cream was the age-old medicine for a broken heart: it worked.

They sat in silence for a few moments, Sharon snickering as she stole the first uncovered brownie chunk. She could tell that Brenda was searching for something to say and she hoped it wouldn't be about Vivien.

"So a granddaughter, huh?" Brenda said, settling on the safer of the available topics.

"If you make a comment about my age, I will shoot you," Sharon warned.

Brenda chuckled. "No grandma jokes, I promise. She's cute. Really cute."

Sharon warmed immediately to thoughts of the unnaturally happy child. "She is."

"Does she live with her daddy?" Brenda asked conversationally.

So much for a safe subject, thought the captain with a wry little twist of her lips. "No." She paused, carefully licking traces of the sweet ice cream from the corner of her mouth before calmly resuming, "He isn't involved in her life. Cee lives with Paul - my ex-husband," she reminded, glancing over at the blonde, who nodded. "And his wife, Helen."

"Oh." For a moment Brenda concentrated on excavating a ball of cookie dough, finding herself at a loss. Her instinct was always to question, to push for more details, but the renewed wariness surrounding Sharon warned her off. So instead she asked, "Do you get to see her a lot?"

The other woman smiled, again at ease. "Oh, yes. Several times a week."

Brenda chuckled, and Sharon raised her eyebrows, her spoon poised over the carton. "What?"

"No, just - Sharon Raydor, International Woman of Mystery. It's hard seein' you as somebody's granny."

The captain practically spat her mouthful of ice cream onto the coffee table. "Don't you dare!" she exclaimed. "Don't you dare use that awful word when you refer to me!"

"You could trade in the Blahniks for support hose and Dr. Scholl's, the Armani for Liz Claiborne -"

"I could easily shoot you and make it look like an accident."

"And after you finish oiling your gun, you can oil your aching joints with Ben Gay, and -"

Again Brenda broke off, her words abruptly stopped by a stinging faceful of throw pillow, but she grinned, incredibly pleased that Sharon was again snarling and spitting with irritation, light years away from the pale shell of a woman the deputy chief had glimpsed for those few, disconcerting moments earlier that day.

Brenda would've recognized the razor-sharp crease of the pale gray trousers and the sleek fall of medium-brown hair as belonging to Sharon Raydor even had the green eyes reflected in the bathroom mirror not met hers as the chief stepped out of a stall the next morning. The blonde smiled automatically. "Capt'n Raydor," she greeted the other woman, reaching out toward the soap dispenser.

The answering smile, small but warm, reassured her that last night's effort at making amends had done its work. "Chief," Sharon replied in a neutral, silky murmur.

"I'll have my report about yesterday's homicide to you right after lunch," Brenda promised conscientiously.

Sharon tossed her crumpled paper towel into the bin. "It's fine. I still have -" Her eyes darted to her slim wristwatch - "fifty-one hours. At your earliest convenience will do."

"After lunch," Brenda repeated, and the older woman nodded and slipped out into the corridor.

Provenza, Flynn, and Sanchez were sharing a laugh near the open door of the break room, but none of them looked more surprised than the captain herself when the deputy chief fairly came bursting around the corner behind her, loudly calling, "Sharon!"

The two lieutenants exchanged twin skeptical stares, and Raydor pivoted, wide-eyed at the very public use of her given name. "Yes, chief?" she responded cautiously.

The blonde stopped within arm's reach, smiling again. "Brenda," she suggested, and Provenza ostentatiously choked on his coffee.

Behind the fluorescent glare on the lenses of her glasses, Sharon blinked. "You are my superior officer, Chief Johnson," she pointed out in a voice pitched low enough that the men couldn't overhear. "As such, it is my duty to address you in a manner befitting the rank you have earned."

Brenda flinched. She knew Sharon was sincere, but she heard an echo of herself demanding that the FID captain always call her 'chief.' "I'm also your friend."

Sharon's lips curved into a tiny smile. "I know that. Chief."

"For heaven's sake, I call Will_ Will_," Brenda returned, mildly exasperated. "He's my superior officer. He's everybody's superior officer! And I report to him; you don't report to me."

The captain smirked, appearing to be enjoying this. "Yes, but we've never slept together." As soon as Sharon heard her own words, she flushed a rare deep rose but also snorted out a laugh, as if both surprised and amused by herself, and Brenda laughed too.

"Is that a proposition?"

Green eyes rolled toward the ceiling. "Very well._ Bren-da_it is. So I'll expect your completed report after lunch, Brenda."

With that Sharon pivoted and headed back down the corridor, and Brenda Leigh smiled to herself, ignoring the stares of the three members of her team who were taking an inordinately long time to replenish their coffee. Her request that Sharon call her by her first name at work hadn't been a spur-of-the-moment thing. It was an outward expression of something yesterday's disquieting turn of events had brought home to the deputy chief: if she and Sharon Raydor were going to be friends, real, true friends, they couldn't just be Brenda and Sharon off the clock, and Deputy Chief Johnson and Captain Raydor while they were on. The twain needed to meet, or their friendship would suffer from a severe case of multiple personality disorder. Never again did she want to snap out an order to Captain Raydor and be answered by that exhausted, haunted look in Sharon's eyes.


	7. Chapter 7

**Title: Since You Went Away**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 3795**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Apologies for the delay between chapters-Ms. I-Must-Go-First has been sickly, but we wanted to make sure we posted in time for the holiday. Here's a little Thanksgiving morsel to enjoy along with your turkey and pie. (Or, you know, your peanut butter and jelly.) Let us know what you think! Comments are love.**

Chapter Seven: Annie, Get Your Gun

Brenda had known for months that this day would come but had been entirely unprepared for the reality of it. It had been nothing like she expected. There were no tears. There was no hostility. There were no wistful goodbyes. One minute she was Mrs. Fritz Howard, and the next she wasn't.

She'd gone home after she received the official decree, having no desire to deal with the pitying glances of her division. After closing the case on Rosalie MacGuire and arresting Big JJ, Monica Stern, _and_ Officer Reyes, Major Crimes had little more to do than sift through Taylor's cold cases. She wasn't an emotional wreck as everyone had expected her to be, but she capitalized on the assumption anyway, invoking her right to take the afternoon off. She'd stopped by a bakery and bought herself a cake, followed by a hardware store to buy a gallon of paint and various painting accessories.

Brenda would celebrate and mourn her new-found freedom alone in her kitchen.

She set herself to her task with a single-minded focus, taping off the edges of her ceiling and cabinets and quickly cleaning and putting away the various things she'd left on her counters. It wasn't the neat, tidy work of a professional, but it suited her purposes well enough. A flutter of excitement over painting the boring tan walls of her kitchen a bright, cheery yellow replaced the hollow feeling in her stomach and she smiled, feeling as though she might make it through the day without succumbing to the prickling feelings of failure that nagged at the back of her mind.

Brenda tipped back the cover of the cake box, scooping a dollop of frosting off with her finger. She sucked off the creamy, sugary confection and thought, _I've been married and divorced twice_. _I'm a horrible wife._

It was then, as she put the cake in the fridge, that she vowed never to get married again.

She set to mixing the paint, skirting a call from her mother. She felt a momentary surge of guilt, knowing her mama only wanted to make sure she was all right, but Brenda couldn't take the disappointed, sympathetic tone of her mother's voice; she felt bad enough without Willie Rae's unintentional assistance. Before she put away her phone, Brenda tapped out a brief text to Sharon: _It's official. I'm a free woman._

Brenda took a deep breath and swept her hair back into a messy ponytail, deciding to stop feeling sorry for herself. So she'd been in two less-than-perfect marriages - she'd loved her husbands and she'd tried her best to make them work. Perhaps it was the idea that she couldn't be good at everything that gnawed at her. As much as she hated to admit it, Brenda Leigh couldn't win them all.

She rolled the first coat of paint onto the wall with gleaming satisfaction, watching the bland tan color slowly begin to disappear under the vibrant warmth of the yellow. As she stretched her arm and vigorously covered more and more of the tan, she conceded that Sharon had had a point: beige really was no good at all.

For the next two hours, Brenda channelled her energy and focus into painting her kitchen. She swore loudly whenever she touched the roller to the ceiling or a cabinet but found that the exercise was exactly what she needed to keep her thoughts at bay. She wouldn't have minded some company but decided that the alone time would do her good.

She was kneeling on the counter, using a paint brush to carefully touch up the edging, when there was a knock at the door. Brenda looked down at herself, at her paint-covered t-shirt and denim shorts, and glanced back at the front door. The knock sounded again. "Shoot," she muttered to herself, sliding off the counter. She set down the brush and hurried to her door, swiping away an unkempt lock of blonde hair from her cheek before opening the door.

"Sharon! What're you doin' here?"

The captain's green eyes darted over Brenda's form, taking in the splotches of paint on her arms, clothes, and cheek. She smirked. "I got your message earlier. When you didn't respond, I thought I'd better stop by when I got out of work to make sure you were okay."

"Oh! You wrote back?" She stepped aside, letting Sharon enter the apartment. "Sorry...I've been paintin' the kitchen. Guess I didn't hear it."

Sharon smiled at the sight of Brenda's new red sofa. "Painting, huh?"

Brenda shrugged. "After today, I needed a change."

Sharon reached out, the pad of her thumb wiping away the streak of yellow paint on Brenda's cheek. The younger woman automatically focused on the bright smear now marring Sharon's pristine skin, but the captain didn't appear fazed. "Let's see," she prodded, and Brenda obligingly led the way to the kitchen.

It didn't look too bad, Brenda thought, anxiously surveying the work-in-progress mess that she'd left. There was still a stray streak of yellow on the white ceiling, and the drop cloth had seen better days, but that was what drop cloths were for. She cast a sidelong glance at her friend, hoping for approval.

The smile that graced Sharon's face was genuinely warm. "It looks lovely, Brenda."

Brenda flushed with pleasure at the approbation. "I don't suppose you want to help me finish up? Although probably not while you're wearin' your nice clothes."

"I'll help," Sharon responded gamely. "But not tonight. We have somewhere to be. Now, do you want to go like that, or would you rather change first?"

"Go where?" Brenda demanded, a little dazed.

"That would be telling," Sharon retorted with a smirk. "Nowhere fancy. You're fine the way you are."

Brenda looked down doubtfully, quickly surveying her attire. Normally she'd insist on at least changing out of the paint-spattered t-shirt, but today wasn't a normal day. It was the first day of her official freedom as a newly single woman, and she decided that newly-single Brenda didn't care what anyone thought of her. Besides, she looked good in yellow.

"Okay," she said. "Let me get my purse."

She thought Sharon looked a bit surprised by her easy acquiescence, but the brunette knew better than to question her sudden good fortune.

After a series of twists and turns on an assortment of back roads (well, back roads by Los Angeles standards; not by rural Georgia standards) to avoid the jammed freeways, Sharon pulled into a parking space in front of a long, low, unassuming structure. As she extracted the key from the ignition and popped the door locks, Brenda looked over at her and raised her eyebrows. "You brought me to the firin' range?"

"It would appear so, wouldn't it?" Sharon grinned. "Come on."

Sharon had driven them to a public range Brenda had never visited before, not to the LAPD facility; and the young woman who checked their IDs greeted the captain as if they were acquainted. "Indoor or outdoor?" she asked, and Sharon tilted her chin, deferring to the smaller woman.

"Pick your poison, Brenda Leigh."

"Um." Brenda quickly licked her lips and looked around, surveying the facility. "Indoor's fine."

"It's quiet tonight," the young woman said, supplying them with protective eyewear, earplugs, and earmuffs. She indicated that the two women sign in and then pointed down the hall.

"It won't be for long," Sharon replied with a smirk. She nodded her thanks to the attendant and guided Brenda into the long corridor, passing a man who was shooting at, and missing, his target. She led Brenda to the last two stalls, furthest away from the room's only other occupant.

"Wanna tell me why we're at the shootin' range?" Brenda asked, setting down her headgear and purse. She reached into the black bag's depths and extracted her holstered weapon.

"When Paul and I divorced," Sharon began, extracting her glock from the holster around her waist, "I felt completely out of control of my life. So, I came here."

"Were you _that_ angry?"

Sharon slung her hair over her shoulder. "I suppose I was, to an extent. I had two kids to raise and I was on my own. I needed to reaffirm my sense of self."

"So you decided to shoot somethin'?"

Sharon grinned again, an expression Brenda hadn't thought her face capable of wearing until a few months ago. "To hell and back." She nodded in the direction of the paper target. "Go on. Give it a try and tell me you don't feel better about your life."

Brenda nodded, not entirely sold on Sharon's coping mechanism. She wasn't _angry_ at Fritz or at herself, but she trusted Sharon's intuition. She loaded her weapon, slid into her eye and ear protection, and clicked off the safety. She glanced at Sharon in the booth beside her before aiming her gun.

Sharon admired the younger woman's form, taking in the determined gaze in her deep brown eyes, the solid but not tense squaring of her arms and shoulders, and the steady stance of her legs. The shorts were somewhat shorter than Sharon had initially thought, showing off the defined muscle tone in Brenda's legs.

She hadn't realized she was staring until she heard the firing of the gun. Her gaze flicked to the target, which now had a hole through the place where its heart would have been, and back to the cocky blonde cradling her handgun. "There, now, captain," Brenda drawled after lifting the protective ear muffs, "that's how the real police do our shootin'."

Sharon's eyes narrowed. Brenda wanted to tease, did she? Paint her as a hapless desk jockey? "Is it?" she returned coolly. She signalled to the younger woman to drop her protective gear back into place, and when she had, Sharon squeezed off six shots in rapid succession, efficiently emptying the magazine of her gun. She then tilted her head, considering. If the human outline on the target had been a real, especially vicious criminal, his brain matter would now be somewhere in Nevada.

"Not bad," Brenda drawled when they had both again lifted the highly fashionable protective gear, and Sharon rolled her eyes. The woman could be insufferable when she chose. "But bein' able to shoot at a paper target hardly proves you can do the same in the field."

The brunette smirked condescendingly and flipped her hair back over her shoulder, lowering her gun to dangle by her thigh. "Face it, Brenda. I'm a better shot than you. It's hardly anything to be ashamed of: I was first in my academy class in marksmanship."

The blonde didn't appear convinced. "That's nice, capt'n. And when was the last time you actually discharged your weapon in a professional capacity?"

"It's been a while, since I spend most of my time investigating the officers who deem it necessary to go around blasting the crap out of animate and inanimate objects in order to prove their prowess," she responded equally snidely. On the surface this sounded exactly like the sort of exchange Captain Raydor and Deputy Chief Johnson might have had a year or two ago; the difference lay in the twinkle in Sharon's eyes and the amused grin that threatened to break over Brenda's features at any second.

"Again," the deputy chief decided, signalling to the range supervisor for new targets. Sharon shrugged, all cool nonchalance, and again flipped her implausibly perfect hair over her shoulder. It occurred to Brenda that, still wearing her stilettos and without so much as a crease in her designer suit, Sharon Raydor looked like an older, more interesting version of one of Charlie's Angels.

They both emptied the chambers of their guns. The captain's shots were undeniably cleaner. Brenda Leigh frowned. If Sharon had brought her here as a way for Brenda to vent whatever frustration she felt at the end of her second marriage, being out-gunned by the other woman was having precisely the opposite effect. "Switch with me," she decreed authoritatively, holding out her unloaded weapon, and Sharon had the nerve to flash her what Clay Johnson would've called a shit-eatin' grin as she complied.

"Yes, chief," Sharon taunted. "Whatever you say, chief."

This time one of the captain's shots went a little wide, but not wide enough to alter her conviction that she was a better shot than the deputy chief.

"Outside," Brenda decided tersely. "Shotguns." Her muscles had tightened a little and her pulse was thumping faster with irritation and adrenaline, and, truth be told, she couldn't deny that the sensation was not entirely unpleasant. Sharon was certainly taking her mind off any desire she might've had to shoot Agent Fritz Howard. The younger woman just wondered if the captain had intended to accomplish her goal by making Brenda want to shoot her instead.

Sharon's laugh rang out. "Shotguns? You wouldn't prefer a sub-machine gun? An uzi? A Kalash?"

"They got those?" Brenda retorted, re-holstering her handgun, and then exited her little booth and strode briskly down the hallway. Sharon's high heels clicked and clacked as she followed equally briskly behind.

They rented a pair of shotguns, the attendant giving an amused smile at the flushed faces of the two officers. The blonde inspected both of the guns, comparing their empty chambers, clean double barrels, and the tension in the triggers. Satisfied that they were of equal caliber, she flashed a grin at the captain. "Let's see how you do with a moving target."

Sharon nearly snorted. "Have you ever _seen_ my handiwork with a shotgun, Brenda?"

"No, but I've heard all about it. Flynn keeps that beanbag on his desk, you know." She held the door open for Sharon, allowing her to pass.

Sharon chuckled. "Ah yes...the day I earned their respect. I remember it fondly."

"They like to exaggerate," the deputy chief quickly added, hoping to deflate a little of the captain's well-earned hubris. "I think I need to see for myself."

"Perhaps this wasn't the best of ideas."

"Why's that?" Brenda asked, observing as a man and a woman on the field shot at two clay pigeons that were released.

"What sort of friend am I to have brought you here only to bruise your ego?" The captain smirked teasingly.

Brenda raised an eyebrow. "That sounds like a challenge to me, Captain."

"So it is."

"You're gonna eat your words," Brenda replied haughtily, not entirely convinced of her own excellent qualifications. She was more than confident in her abilities, but she had learned her lesson about doubting Sharon's. "Best out of ten shots; loser buys dinner."

"Deal."

Clay had been taking Brenda Leigh and her brothers out to their uncle's farm in the country to shoot makeshift skeet since she was twelve years old. No way could some city-bred East Coast Yankee compete. She caressed the butt of the gun, learning its curves and contours, surveying the range - they all grew to look pretty much the same after a point - and finally looking over at her companion. She snickered quietly. Sharon was by far the most incongruous feature in this landscape. Brenda looked much more at home in her paint-splattered shorts and t-shirt.

Her gaze tracked up to the other woman's face and found green eyes studying her with condescending humor. "I know you're not judging the book by its cover." Sharon caught someone's eye and lifted one hand, and a male voice called out, "Okay, ladies, range goin' hot."

Through eight rounds, it looked as if all the boasting on both sides of the aisle was for naught: the two women were equally matched, pairs of clay discs shattering as regularly as if they were programmed to detonate. Brenda was focused utterly on the moving targets, on the way the gun felt in her hands and balanced against her shoulder, on the confident strength of her own body shifting to offset the recoil. Her mind cleared, her thoughts streamlining to the essentials. She was a strong, confident woman; she was Brenda Leigh Johnson - and she had a gun. She could deal with all of life's problems as easy as she was dealing with these silly little bits of clay, blast them to bits and send them scattering in the wind.

"I was first in marksmanship too," she said contentedly, dropping her shoulders for just a moment. "And my trainin' was considerably more recent than yours."

"_Hah_," Sharon scoffed, an explosive burst of sound from her soft mouth.

This interval was longer than the others had been. As she awaited her penultimate turn, Brenda lowered her weapon and looked over at Sharon again.

And her eyes widened. She looked away, and then looked again.

Gone was the business-suited FID captain. She had stripped the expensive jacket off and casually tossed it behind her, leaving her in dress pants and a flimsy little white camisole that exhibited the muscles of her upper arms, softer than Brenda's but still strong and well-defined. She'd yanked her hair back into a ponytail, but a few strands had escaped to curl around her ears and against her cheek. Her skin shimmered with perspiration. And her feet were bare.

Good grief. Instead of a desk jockey for the LAPD, she looked like a fitting companion for Indiana Jones, or better yet, like that character from those video games and that movie starring Angelina Jolie, the one about -

"Oh, _shoot_!" Brenda Leigh cried, dismayed, because she hadn't. Sharon's eyebrows arched as both women watched the skeet fall benignly to the ground.

Sharon's befuddled gaze cleared after a couple of seconds, and the most triumphant, maddening smirk Brenda had ever seen adorned her features. "Why, chief," she drawled, "did something _distract_ you?"

Brenda narrowed her eyes. "Now that's just not fair," she whined, adamantly avoiding the way the camisole clung to the curves of Sharon's breasts (had she known that Sharon Raydor looked _this _good under all those expensive suits?). "You did that on purpose."

Sharon feigned innocence. "Did what, chief?" She hoisted her gun, preparing herself for her next shot, lest she miss it altogether as Brenda had.

Brenda scowled, watching the other woman poised and ready to best her. She stomped her foot, undeniably irritated that her concentration had been broken. "You must be feelin' pretty threatened," Brenda said, "to go to all that trouble to distract me. Whatsa matter, captain? Didn't think you could beat me fair and square?"

The brunette fired, nailing her skeet with practiced ease. She flashed Brenda a smug smile. "Oh I _know_ I can beat you. It's too bad your attention was elsewhere."

The chief's glare could have melted ice. She readied herself for her final shot, obliterating the last clay disc. She met Sharon's gaze with a cocky smile. "Wasn't elsewhere that time. Looks like your ploy didn't work all that great."

Sharon shook her head, her ponytail brushing her back as she lifted her shotgun for her final round. She watched the sky, her stomach clenched in anxious readiness.

"I think maybe your son was right," Brenda continued, her voice carrying a teasing lilt. "Strippin' down like you did to catch my eye...maybe you do wanna date me after all."

Sharon's eyes widened as she fired her gun, cheeks reddening as her bullet narrowly missed her skeet. She turned to Brenda and drew her mouth into a thin line. "You play dirty, Brenda Leigh."

Brenda laughed, her smile contagious as she waved off the man who had been firing their skeet. "Thanks!" she called out before turning back to the other woman. "So do you. Would you have me any other way?"

Sharon brushed the dirt from her feet as she slipped back into her heels. "No, I suppose I wouldn't. It wouldn't be nearly as much fun if you didn't give as good as you got."

"Turnabout's fair play," Brenda added. "I gotta say though, I'm impressed." She watched as Sharon bent to retrieve her jacket, her eyes accidentally peering down the shadowy dip of her cleavage. "You've got skills, captain."

Sharon fell into step beside the deputy chief as they headed back toward the building. "High praise, coming from you."

"And? Has your opinion changed about me?" Brenda asked, blatantly fishing for the captain's complimentary assessment.

"You're not too shabby," Sharon replied. "I'll give you that."

"_Not too shabby_?!" Brenda scoffed. "I'm good and you know it."

Sharon held open the door. "Your ego's big enough without me feeding it." The blonde swept past the captain, setting her gun on the counter. When she looked back, Sharon had shrugged back into her blazer. "Let's agree that we're evenly matched and leave it at that, shall we?"

The blonde preened, proudly accepting the admission. As they paid for their rentals, Brenda silently brimmed with unspent adrenaline and immense satisfaction. She couldn't remember the last time she felt so overwhelmed by the raw, unbridled pleasure of her own skill. She felt, for the first time in far too long, completely capable. She felt infused with power, with righteous self-assurance. She was single and she would be just fine.

They wandered back into the parking lot and headed for Sharon's car. Swept up in giddy excitement, Brenda spontaneously threw her arms around the older woman and gave her a swift hug. "Thank you for this," she said, nearly laughing when Sharon's hands awkwardly patted her back. She pulled away, grinning widely. "You're a great friend."

Startled by the impromptu hug - their first - Sharon slipped her hands into her pockets. "I'm glad it helped."

"It sure did! C'mon...I'll buy us dinner."

"Of course, you know," Sharon said as she unlocked the car, "you're right. To settle this matter once and for all, a field test would be necessary."

Brenda quirked an eyebrow, grinning with amusement. "What do you suggest?"

The captain pursed her lips, all straightforward innocence. "Those ties Commander Taylor wears..."

The younger woman snorted out a laugh. "Like walkin' around with a big target strapped to his chest."

"They've gotta be good for something," Sharon agreed, sliding into the driver's seat.

Brenda Leigh grinned as she fastened her seatbelt. "It'd be too easy, though. No real test of skill at all, which is kinda too bad." She tilted her head, considering. "How do you feel about Mexican? I think I deserve a margarita."

Sharon smirked as she whipped the car out onto the road. "After today, you deserve two." There was a beat of silence. "Besides, it's not like I have to pay for them, since you can't out-shoot me."

Brenda huffed and gazed out the side window to hide her smile, glad not to be alone with her thoughts and her paint-roller.


	8. Chapter 8

**Title: Since You Went Away**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Pairing: Brenda/Sharon**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 5805**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Once again, we're very sorry about the delay between chapters. Here's the newest installment, wherein you can decide if Brenda and Sharon made Santa's "Naughty" or "Nice" list this year. Your comments are amazing-thank you for your continued support! Enjoy!**

**Chapter Eight: The Hustler**

Sharon was standing just inside the hallowed halls of Major Crimes, surveying a stunningly vacant, darkened murder room and trying to decide whether she could work up a really good measure of justified indignation or if she was just too tired when her phone chimed, signalling the arrival of a new text or email. She hesitated, trepidation edging her bone-deep weariness. If it was an email, it could be from Chief Pope. Commander Rames had been turning a mottled purple and making noises about going straight to the chief when Sharon had last seen the head of Vice an hour or so earlier. Could she pretend she was unavailable? Say she'd dropped her phone in the toilet, or something, and high-tail it home?

When the captain finally decided to retire, she'd go postal if some joker gave her a gold watch as a parting gift. When that day arrived, if ever it did, she fully intended to destroy every timepiece she owned and to avoid hearing the words "seventy-two-hour reporting cycle" ever again, even if it meant she'd have to shatter her own eardrums.

With a resigned sigh, she drew her phone from her bag and activated the screen. She relaxed fractionally when she saw the little text message envelope, and tapped it with her fingertip.

_Hey! We're having a celebratory drink at Malloy's. Come by and then we'll go to dinner._

The captain's irritation ebbed. Brenda hadn't forgotten about their plans after all, then, and Sharon could now admit to herself that she'd been looking forward to dinner and a movie with her friend as the reward at the end of this unexpectedly hellish week.

On the surface, Captain Raydor reacted with the same calm neutrality to each new investigation that crossed her desk, but privately she shuddered each time she had to tangle with Vice. It wasn't that the division's officers were especially corrupt - that would've been a little too much of a cliche. They were, however, especially difficult to deal with, because they assumed that _Raydor_ assumed they were all bent. The massive chip on their collective shoulders weighed Sharon down. And Commander Rames - suffice it to say that she preferred Commander Taylor. She suspected Rames had seen one too many episodes of _Miami Vice_, and fancied himself a suave Don Johnson type, despite his potbelly and liver spots.

On second thought, the brunette wrinkled her nose. The last word she'd use to describe her current mood was 'celebratory', and if there were two individuals on God's green earth sure to make her feel even less so, they were Louie Provenza and Andy Flynn.

Still, insisting that she'd just meet Brenda afterward would be churlish.

When Sharon darkened the doorway, so to speak, of Malloy's, she always felt a little like an out-of-town gunslinger in an old John Ford movie. The place was unashamedly a cop bar, its walls decorated with photos of fallen men and women in blue, and there were always a few seconds of frozen hostility from the patrons before they went back to sipping their screwdrivers or slurping their beers. Tonight was no exception, but the captain was prepared. She surveyed the Friday night crowd and spotted several familiar faces, but not the ones she was looking for.

"Hey, Captain Raydor! Whatcha drinkin'?"

Mike Tao's boisterous greeting was so unexpected, on multiple levels, that Sharon actually gave a little jump. "Hello, lieutenant," she said, looking up at the man looming over her left shoulder and wondering how such a large man could move so stealthily.

"Everybody's back there." He jerked his thumb over his own left shoulder, indicating the alcove housing Malloy's two weatherbeaten pool tables. "Playin' pool. It's my turn for a drink run. What'll you have?"

"Oh, ah -" Sharon blinked, startled, and knew her glasses made her look particularly owlish. "That's okay. I'll get mine."

Tao clapped a large hand on her blazer-clad shoulder. "No way, we're celebrating! You a beer drinker? You don't look like a beer drinker."

"Whiskey," Sharon responded vaguely. "Whiskey and Coke." She was looking in the direction Tao had indicated; if she dodged slightly to the left, she could see that Flynn appeared to be running the table while Provenza scowled, one hand on his hip and a cue dangling forlornly from the other, and the others looked on and watched.

When Brenda Leigh leaned forward, contorting herself around Detective Gabriel, and called, "Yoohoo, Sharon!" the captain knew the deputy chief was a couple of drinks ahead of little wave only confirmed older woman focused on Brenda's sunny smile, blocking out the much cooler responses of the men, as she walked over to join them.

"You made it," Brenda said cheerfully, edging over so there was room for Sharon to lean against the wall beside her. "I was worried you wouldn't get my text."

"Congratulations on closing your case. I'd toast you, but -"

"The captain needs a drink!" Brenda cried, surprising her. "David -"

"No, no." Sharon reached across the smaller woman, laying her hand on Gabriel's sleeve. "Tao's getting me one. He insisted."

Brenda huffed. "Of course he insisted," she retorted as if it were the most obvious thing in the world - as if everyone in Major Crimes would be nothing but delighted to see Captain Raydor. Sharon snickered to herself. Chocolate eyes shifted back to the pool table and the chief called out, "Good game, Andy!" Sharon wondered if Brenda Leigh had been a cheerleader in high school. She could just picture it.

"Challenging all comers!" Flynn replied with a grin. "Anybody who actually _knows_ how to play pool dare to take me on?"

Provenza folded his arms and grumbled, but brightened slightly when Tao tapped his shoulder with a cold longneck.

To everyone's surprise, Brenda pushed herself away from the wall. "I will," she said.

Sanchez raised his eyebrows. "You know how to play, chief?"

"Sure." Brenda grinned, pushing up the sleeves of the teal sweater she wore with gray slacks. "I haven't played in ages, but my daddy had a pool table down in the basement when I was growin' up."

Tao handed Sharon her whiskey and Coke and gave the chief what looked like vodka and lime. Brenda promptly gave hers to Sharon to hold, reaching to take the second cue from Provenza. "You ready, lieutenant?" At Flynn's nod, she grinned and batted her long eyelashes. "Watch and learn, y'all."

The men cheered sportingly, raising their glasses to the deputy chief's success. Provenza patted Flynn apologetically on the back, reminding the younger lieutenant that allegiances were pledged to the woman in charge. Sharon hid a smirk in her glass as she took a sip of her drink, sucking her teeth as the alcohol pleasantly burned her throat. It settled warmly in the pit of her stomach and, as she quickly chased that sip with a larger one, Sharon decided to grant herself a night off.

She watched as Flynn twisted the blue chalk cube over the tip of his cue. "Whaddya say, chief - give it a blow for good luck?" He grinned lasciviously at her and Sharon nearly choked on her drink.

Brenda, for her part, merely laughed. "Ha! In your dreams!" She waved at Provenza. "Go on now."

"I think not," Provenza immediately said, plucking the chalk from Flynn's hand and passing it to the deputy chief.

Brenda chuckled and, after powdering her cue, turned to Sharon. "What about you, captain?" Brenda asked, eyes twinkling as she held out her cue. "For luck?"

Ignoring the boorish whoops of the other men, Sharon licked her lips and leaned forward, locking eyes with the blonde as she puckered her lips together and blew away the excess chalk. She then leaned back against the wall, her cheeks hot and her belly hotter. She raised her glass to Brenda. "Good luck."

The deputy chief turned back to the others with a broad, cocky grin. "Rack 'em up."

Sharon watched the scene with a momentary sense of detachment; though her own division maintained its own sense of camaraderie, she couldn't remember the last time they'd all gone out as a group. It seemed that where Internal Affairs was concerned, most officers preferred to get as far away as possible from the job-and, subsequently, each other-as soon as they reached their down time. She didn't blame them. She liked her co-workers, but she didn't want to invite them into her personal life.

The members of Major Crimes, however, were incredibly tight-knit. Though she was an outsider looking in, Sharon was surprised that she no longer felt that imminent hostility and suspicion while in their presence. She didn't feel particularly unwelcome. As she sucked back the rest of her drink, startled to have reached the bottom of the glass already, she mused over the possibility that the team had warmed up to her simply because Brenda had.

She looked at the woman in question, admiring the smooth lines of her body as she cleanly broke the balls, calling out "solids" as two slid effortlessly into the corner pockets. This wasn't the quiet night Sharon had been looking forward to but she found that her disappointment was rapidly waning. She crunched on a piece of ice and asked a passing waiter for a refill.

"She may have you by the proverbial balls, my friend," Provenza consoled as Brenda sank another ball on her next turn. Flynn's confidence had simmered down considerably as his stripes managed to miss more often than not.

Sharon's eyes focused once more on Brenda, studying the other woman's form. She hadn't decided whether the deputy chief was a decent player or if Flynn was simply distracted by the fluttering brown eyes of the younger woman. His crush was no secret and Sharon could barely suppress a laugh as she realized that Flynn would have been much worse off had Brenda been wearing a skirt. As it was, the lieutenant was lucky that Brenda was on the other side of the table; from where Sharon stood, she had the best vantage point and could easily see just how flattering Brenda's gray pants were.

The waiter returned with Sharon's refreshed drink and, not having realized she had been staring at her friend's ass, she blinked and awkwardly thanked him.

Tao had taken Brenda's spot leaning against the wall beside Sharon, and now he bent slightly toward her. "The chief has good form."

"Yes," the captain agreed, doing her best not to blush. Flynn made a shot, and Sharon turned her attention to the man beside her. "Do you play, lieutenant?"

"My name is Mike."

If it had been anyone else, Sharon would've sworn he was flirting with her, but the open friendliness on Tao's face spoke for itself. She smiled slightly, awkward, and sipped her drink. "Do you play, _Mike_?" she repeated.

"Not personally, no. But I appreciate the sheer beauty of the physical geometry involved. Now, see -" He gestured excitedly toward the game in progress. "See how Andy just missed that shot? That's because he failed to correctly determine the angle of trajectory of the secondary mover - that is, that blue ball there -"

_Blue balls_, Sharon thought with a little smirk, and it occurred to her that she hadn't had time to eat lunch. Maybe she should order a bar snack, if Brenda wanted to stay for much longer.

Tao was still talking. "Lay off, Mike," groused Provenza, sidling up to them. "If you bore Captain Raydor enough, she'll probably audit us again."

The captain folded her lips together to suppress a grin. "You never know," she agreed. "Anything's possible."

"The captain," murmured Gabriel, who seemed to be the most buttoned-up of the group, "needs another drink." She was startled to see that she did, and looked around for at least a dish of peanuts or stale pretzels, something to have on her stomach, not that she felt she needed it. She felt just _fine_. "May I, ma'am?"

Sharon flashed him a smile, and judging by the look on the detective's face, it was an unusual one. "Thank you, detective."

"Do you play, captain?" asked Provenza's gravelly voice.

"Oh, ah -" Maybe she needed that snack after all. Sharon knew her reflexes were off as she felt her eyes widen in slow motion.

"You should," Tao chimed in. "It looks like this game's almost over."

Flynn grumbled something under his breath, and Provenza positively cackled.

"I don't know what you're so pleased about," muttered the younger of the two lieutenants. "If the chief can beat me, imagine how badly she'd kick _your_ ass."

"Come on, Sharon," Brenda called out, looking over her shoulder with a bright grin and batting her eyelashes. "I could use some real competition."

"I don't play," the older woman replied. She contemplated the dregs of her second drink and pressed against the wall, as if hoping to fade out of sight.

"I'll show you how!" Provenza exclaimed with a shadow of a leer, and Sharon thought, _Monday someone will tell him he tried it on with the Wicked Witch, and he'll never live it down. _The man was definitely in his cups, but he was also the hero of the hour - something about him running, or at least jogging.

"I don't think she wants to be taught how to lose," Flynn snorted. "I can help you out, captain." He flashed her a grin and the wink he usually reserved for Brenda, and Sharon felt her lips part slightly in amazement.

"Come on, Sharon, play," Brenda wheedled. "It'll be fun."

Perhaps incongruously, the captain flashed back to junior high gym class, when she'd been coerced into playing volleyball. "It's a team sport," her best friend, Emma Madison, had pointed out. "It can't be that bad, Sharon. All you have to do is stand there."

Sharon had given into peer pressure, and it _had_ been that bad.

And this wasn't even a team sport. She'd be expected to do more than stand there, wouldn't she?

Before Sharon could point out that she hadn't said she didn't know how to play, just that she _didn't_ play, Brenda added, "And don't worry, _I_ can teach you." _You won't have to let Flynn man-handle you_, her expression seemed to say.

The green-eyed captain bit her lip and looked around at the expectant faces of the men surrounding her, and especially at the bright smile of the one woman. "I guess this means we're not going to the 9:00 showing of _The Artist_," she murmured.

"There'll be other showin's." Brenda tossed back the remains of her drink and held the empty glass out to Sanchez. "Come on. It'll be fun, really. I promise."

Sharon swallowed, and then she tossed back the dregs of her drink as well. And then, for perhaps only the second time in fifty-four-plus years, Sharon Raydor gazed helplessly into the eyes of a good friend and spectacularly caved to peer pressure. "Okay," she agreed. "I guess it might be fun, if you're sure you can show me how."

Brenda's eyes twinkled, and she radiated confidence. "Of course I can. A Georgia girl like me, capt'n?" She looked from her cue to Sharon, as if sizing them both up. "It's just another skills test. Just like the firin' range." The blonde swept her hair back and looked at her team. "Now, who's gonna play against us?"

Sharon frowned. "I thought we were going to play each other."

Dark chocolate eyes rolled toward the dingy ceiling. "How can I play against you when I'm showin' you how to play?"

Flynn handed off his cue. "Proceed with caution," he warned, eyeing the men around him. He reached into the various pockets on his side of the table, rolling the balls toward the rack that Tao had set on the felt tabletop.

Sharon looked around at each of them as if daring any of them to accept the challenge. Brenda's self-assured, overly confident demeanor was infectious; it didn't matter that Sharon was slightly lightheaded from the alcohol she'd consumed, or that Gabriel was on his way back with her third drink, or even that she wasn't even a member of the cool kid's club-it was _on_. She looked at Provenza.

The older lieutenant held up his hands in surrender. "I know better than to go up against the pair of you," he added, feigning an exaggerated shudder. "Julio, take one for the team."

Sanchez grinned and nodded, setting down his beer in order to grab himself a cue. "Who's with me?"

Gabriel returned to their little corner of the rapidly-filling bar, setting down the three drinks he'd carried back with him. Everyone looked at him expectantly. He blanched. "Um. Did I miss something?"

Flynn snatched up the Coke that the detective had brought back, taking the plastic stirrer between his teeth. "You're playing with Sanchez against the chief and Captain Raydor."

A slightly panicked expression crossed over David's face before he diplomatically loosened his tie and accepted the cue that Julio held out with a flourish.

Brenda turned to Sharon, quickly giving her a once-over. "First things first," she said, her deft hands quickly plucking the two large buttons of Sharon's blazer until it was hanging open. "Get this off and get comfortable. You look like you're here to arrest us."

"Maybe I should..." Sharon muttered, shrugging the jacket off nonetheless, revealing the snug white t-shirt she wore beneath. She draped the blazer over the back of a chair and gamely met the deputy chief's gaze. "Better?"

Brenda's eyes swept over the captain's body, her gaze emboldened by the dangerous confidence-boosting powers of vodka. "Much. Now...you know how to hold the stick, right?"

Sharon smirked, plucking up Brenda's cue where it rested against the table. "You mean the _cue,_ right?"

The blonde waved off the mistake. "You gotta make sure you take a relaxed but firm stance with it. It's not like a shotgun. You get all rigid and you're gonna send balls flyin' everywhere."

Provenza and Flynn tittered on the other side of the table. Sharon shot them a warning glare and, to her immense satisfaction, they both side-shuffled over to the wall. She laughed, warmed by the throaty timbre of her own voice-when was the last time she had loosened up like this?-and demonstrated her form, cradling the wooden cue between her fingers.

"You're bent over too far," Brenda complained, coming around behind the captain. "Straighten your back a little," she instructed, placing her hands on the captain's hips. She tugged gently, pulling Sharon's ass back against the cradle of her own hips, Sharon's spine lengthening. "There...like that."

Sharon flushed, feeling warm all over. When the chief lingered behind her for several minutes and the indistinct drone of nearby chatter filled her ears, the captain cleared her throat and stood. "Thank you for the demonstration," Sharon added, cocking her hip slightly.

Brenda tilted her head, blonde curls sweeping over her shoulder, and grinned. "My pleasure." She looked at their two opponents. "Y'all wanna break?"

Sanchez and Gabriel exchanged a glance. "Ladies first," Gabriel offered, and Sanchez grinned mischievously.

The deputy chief nodded firmly and turned to the only other woman present. "Okay, Sharon."

"Stripes or solids?" asked Sanchez, and Brenda looked at Sharon. "Solids," the brunette replied, seemingly at random.

"Okay, now, wait." Brenda reached around Sharon, her body covering the taller woman's like a shield as she wrapped her right hand around Sharon's right hand. "You're gripping the cue too hard. Ease up on the shaft."

Just off to her right, Sharon heard someone choke and splutter.

"Like that?"

"Yeah." Sharon had to blow out a mouthful of blonde curls as Brenda positioned the captain's left hand, helping her form a bridge. "You're almost ready." Brenda Leigh stood up straight, and Sharon immediately missed the warmth stretched along her spine. A trouser-clad knee nudged her inner thigh and she nearly fell over. "Widen your stance a little, and keep it firm, but don't lock your knees."

Sharon nodded. Locking her knees would be bad. If she locked her knees she might pass out, and that would be more embarrassing than when the volleyball in gym class had broken her glasses.

"Don't worry too much about aimin'."

Long, meticulously straightened chestnut hair fell over Sharon's shoulder as she turned her head and pinned Brenda with an incredulous look.

"No, I mean it. The most important parts of the game are the grip and the stroke," the blonde insisted confidently, and Sharon heard more spluttering.

"This is a trap," Julio announced, ogling his opponents. He looked seriously at Gabriel. "You might have to go on without me."

Gabriel nudged the shorter man in the ribs.

For Sharon's part, she didn't seem to notice the brief exchange. She felt entirely too aware of the chief's body pressed against her own, and even more aware of the fact that she didn't altogether dislike it. She was miles away from the frustrations that had plagued Captain Raydor only an hour before and now appeared to be plummeting headfirst into a whole bevy of new complications.

"Think you can handle this?" Brenda asked smoothly, her body heat causing Sharon to burn.

"You'd be surprised what I can handle," Sharon replied with a smirk, shooting the cue with a quick motion of her hand. The balls clicked and scattered across the table and a yellow solid plunked into the side pocket.

Brenda jumped upright, clapping her hands together swiftly. "Yes! Jus' like that!"

"Beginner's luck," declared Provenza from where he sat with his arms folded. "Don't worry, boys."

"I bet you can handle all kinds of things, can't ya, Captain Raydor?" Flynn jeered teasingly, grinning at her from over Provenza's shoulder. "I bet you've got plenty of experience."

"Don't you wish you knew?" Sharon returned, straightening and waiting for Brenda to take her shot. She made short work of a green solid, and her teammate murmured, "Very nice, chief."

The casual bantering back and forth continued as they each sank another ball before Sharon missed, and then as David and Julio made a respectable showing in their own right. They weren't too badly matched, despite Sharon's vaunted status as a novice; Gabriel was only slightly better than the captain, and Sanchez didn't have Brenda's chops.

"'Kay now, here." Brenda again moved slightly behind Sharon, studying the table intently. "You're gonna take this shot. See how those balls are lined up?" The deputy chief held her hand out, four fingers stiff and straight with her thumb tucked against her palm, indicating the red and dark green balls. "It's a combination, see?"

The captain nodded mutely, her tongue peeking out to run across her lips.

"You have to picture the angle," Tao spoke up helpfully, and Sharon nodded again. She knew that. She'd always been good at math.

"Think you can do it?"

The older woman opened her mouth to say she could, but what came out was, "You might need to help me."

Brenda dimpled with pleasure, and it occurred to Sharon that it was the first time she'd ever actually asked the deputy chief to assist her with anything. Sharon wasn't good at asking for help.

She'd thought she was prepared, but when Brenda's hand rested on her hip, she jerked, and Brenda laughed. "Steady, now," she admonished, giving said hip a little pat. "Nice and smooth, Sharon. Don't rush it."

Across the table, Gabriel and Sanchez exchanged a look of comical dismay. Was there any conceivable way that this was actually happening, or were they all involved in a mass hallucination?

"This one's just a little more complex than the other shots you've been takin', but that doesn't necessarily mean you have to exert more force," Brenda instructed, absently smoothing her hand up the other woman's spine. "You don't want to go ploughin' into it; just finesse it."

This time even Sharon's lips parted in astonishment, and she craned her neck to get a glimpse of the woman hovering behind her. Surely Brenda Leigh realized how she sounded. She couldn't just be oblivious to all those sexual double entendres... could she?

Brenda's features scrunched petulantly as she frowned. "Concentrate," she scolded, and the captain whipped her dark head back around. She was concentrating, just not on the game.

"Yeah, captain," Andy snickered, "_concentrate_," and Sharon leveled a glare at him.

"Bite me," she suggested. "Or better yet, don't. I haven't had my tetanus or rabies shots recently."

Tao and Provenza responded with identical high-pitched _Oooh-oooh_'s, and the chief's grip on Sharon's hip tightened. "Oh, for heaven's sake!" Brenda exclaimed. "Just _do_ it, would you? Get it in there!"

Sharon scratched.

"It's all right," Provenza intoned benevolently. "Not every woman knows how to handle her balls the way Chief Johnson does."

The chief was too irritated by Sharon's mistake to pay attention. "Sharon!" she exclaimed, planting her hands on her own hips this time. "You weren't even tryin'!"

For her part, Sharon was only too glad to straighten, her face flushed with heat and embarrassment. She took a large step away from Brenda, trying to be subtle about it. "Sorry," she muttered, but knew she didn't sound it at all. Thank God their turn was finally over. She lifted a palm to her flaming cheek, and Brenda mistook the cause of her very noticeable flush.

"It's okay," the blonde resumed in a very different tone, smiling softly as she looked directly into Sharon's eyes. "It's just a game. We might even still win."

The brunette smiled back weakly. "I think I need some air."

"Are you all right?" Brenda asked, the playful tone of her voice suddenly serious.

Sharon waved her off. "I'm fine-just a little warm."

"Me too. Let's step outside for a minute, 'kay?" Brenda motioned to Flynn. "C'mon, pinch hitter. We're takin' a breather."

"How do you know what a pinch hitter is?" Provenza asked incredulously.

"More importantly," Flynn butted in, "where are the two of you going?" His eyebrows climbed his forehead; the man was clearly trying not to waggle them suggestively.

"Girl talk," Brenda replied with an impish smile. "You best not lose this game for us."

"You got it, chief," Flynn said, his grin persistent.

"We'll be back in two shakes." With that, Brenda grabbed Sharon's hand and led the way to the front door. Sharon allowed herself to be pulled along.

The cool evening air was a welcome respite from the smoky, overcrowded atmosphere of the bar. Sharon retracted her hand as soon as the door shut behind them, sweeping her hair up into her palm to allow the breeze to whisper across her neck. She tipped her head back and closed her eyes, focusing solely on her breath, hoping to reign in the ceaseless pounding of her heart.

"What's goin' on?" Brenda asked, closer to Sharon than she'd anticipated. "Hot flashes?"

_Ha! Menopause! _Sharon nearly laughed. "Something like that." Her head spun dizzily and she thought longingly of Saltines.

"I know how you feel. All those people in there doesn't help any, does it?"

Sharon simply nodded.

"Havin' fun?"

"It's certainly a change of pace."

"You and I both know that's not an answer. You seemed like you were havin' a good time, bein' a good sport about everythin'..."

Sharon opened her eyes, allowing her hair to fall back across her shoulders. Brenda's face, which had been so peacefully relaxed, was now fraught with tension. "I am having a good time. It's just not what I expected this evening."

The blonde laughed breathlessly. "I know...it's not what I expected either. They've been teasin' me lately. They called me a prude, would you believe it?"

Sharon raised an eyebrow, comprehension slowly dawning. "Honestly, yes."

Brenda swatted at Sharon's arm. "Oh _you_." She sighed. "When they suggested comin' here to celebrate, I just knew I could get them back and I just _knew_ you'd play along."

The brunette swallowed an uncomfortable sensation, something that vaguely resembled disappointment and resentment and tipsy indignation. As soon as she recognized it, it was gone. "I thought you were being particularly _wanton_ this evening," she observed.

"Well, I didn't think you'd mind, seein' how you wanna date me an' all." Brenda winked and Sharon groaned.

"Right. Yes. That's it exactly." Sharon eyed the building, deciding she'd rather face Gabriel and Sanchez now that she was fully apprised of the secondary game that the deputy chief had forgotten to tell her about. "Shall we head back inside?"

Brenda nodded. "Guess it doesn't help that I'm feelin' a little frisky these days," she added, moving toward the door. "Maybe later, when we get outta here, you can give me some advice on..." She lowered her voice "..._vibrators_."

And, just like that, heat burned Sharon's face.

As they traipsed through the main area of the bar, Sharon grabbed the sleeve of a passing server, and before she could open her mouth the smiling young man asked, "Whiskey and Coke, right?"

"And a vodka and lime," Brenda Leigh piped up from over her shoulder, and Sharon smirked. Maybe she should tell him to make the chief's a double.

Brenda had complimented her on being a good sport, which was all well and good, except the older woman couldn't shake the unpleasant feeling that she was also the butt of the joke. She knew that wasn't how the deputy chief had intended it; in the blonde's mind, it was the two of them versus the rest of Major Crimes, teaching all those men a lesson. Getting their Thelma and Louise on, or whatever.

But Sharon hadn't gotten the memo. It was that damn junior high volleyball game all over again. Her glasses were intact this time, but here she was, so flustered by her friend being so unexpectedly - well, _handsy_ - that she was reduced to blaming her response on menopause. It was a less-than-dignified position in which to find herself. Maybe, she thought grimly, she should've let Andy Flynn be her instructor after all; at least that way she would've known exactly what she was in for.

In the back of her mind, a small voice informed Sharon Raydor that she really needed to get laid. Humiliatingly, the voice sounded suspiciously like her son's. She ignored it.

Whiskey and Coke in hand, she had a plan. The captain was going to get her own back.

Lieutenant Flynn was leaning over to take a shot while Sanchez and Gabriel looked on, Gabriel taking a pull from an imported beer and Sanchez sipping on something that looked dark brown and deadly. Sharon didn't break her stride, gaining speed as she approached.

"Step aside, lieutenant," she barked in her full-on Captain Raydor voice, one Flynn was a little too accustomed to hearing, and he responded instinctively, standing up straight and actually lifting one hand in the air. She fleetingly wished she could see Brenda's no-doubt startled expression, but the looks on the faces of the men in front of her gave her a reasonable idea of what her friend's mobile features were doing.

"Need that," she continued in the same tone of command, snapping her fingers. A bewildered, half-admiring Flynn handed over his cue, and she glimpsed Provenza's exaggerated moue of dismay. She pivoted, pointing one manicured finger straight at Lieutenant Tao. "Rack 'em up, _Mike_."

As the astonished Tao hastened to comply, Sharon transferred all her weight to one foot, lowered one hand to her hip in her best bad-ass pose, and fervently prayed she wasn't about to make a complete ass of herself.

Brenda sidled up alongside her, tapping her restless fingers against her glass. Her expression was one of bemused interest and she raised an eyebrow. "Goin' on your own already?"

"Oh I think I can handle it," Sharon said dismissively, watching as Tao compulsively spun each of the balls until the numbers were displayed on top.

"You didn't like bein' my partner?" Brenda asked, tilting her head. She swung her hips gently and Sharon wondered if this was Brenda's own flirtatious nature or if she was simply continuing to put on a show.

"Ready for you, captain," Tao announced, removing the rack cleanly from the table.

Sharon bared her teeth in a dangerous smile. She leaned in close to Brenda's face, brushing aside an errant lock of hair in order to get closer to her ear. "It's showtime, Brenda Leigh," she whispered, her voice low and husky. Sharon took a particular thrill in the noticeable shiver that coursed over the younger woman's body. Without further preamble, Sharon turned her attention to the table.

"I don't like the look of this," Provenza muttered. "I don't like this _at all_."

Brenda laughed and rolled her eyes. "She'll be just fine," she cooed, appreciatively eyeing the older woman's form in lining up her cue with the cue ball.

"I've known this woman a lot longer than you have, chief," Provenza replied, pointing at the captain. "She's sneaky. Mark my words-she's got something up her sleeve."

Sharon merely smirked as she took her first shot, pocketing two stripes and a solid right away. She caught Brenda's impressed grin and shifted to the other side of the table, sending the cue ball into a flawless combination shot.

Brenda gaped.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Provenza announced, "I think we've been hustled."

The blonde watched as the captain moved seamlessly around the table, sinking her shots as if she had been playing for years. It occurred to Brenda through the hazy fog of tipsy exhilaration that Sharon had said she _didn't_ play, not that she _couldn't_. The look of stern concentration on her friend's face as she plotted her next shot was nearly as sexy than her cool, flirtatious confidence, if not moreso.

Brenda hadn't thought twice about the fact that Sharon had so easily entrusted her with the task of teaching her how to play; she'd been too caught up in the thrill of tempting the other woman with innuendo, too wrapped up in seeing just how far she was able to tease the captain until she broke. It had been far more intoxicating than her limey beverage to see the woman let her hair down. For a woman plagued with her own burgeoning sexual frustration, Brenda had noticed it immediately in her friend and had poked and prodded her inhibitions until Sharon was practically oozing sensuality.

She had hoped to prove a point to her men that she was not a prude, but she was forced to admit that she had proven something entirely different: that Sharon Raydor-the woman, not the captain-was a tempting prospect indeed. She could only imagine what she'd overhear them saying on Monday morning.


	9. Chapter 9

**Title: Since You Went Away - Chapter Nine: The Cutting Edge**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: K+ (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 6134**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: It appears that we have lost most of our readers, but for those of you who have faithfully stuck by us (Moasaicburst, it's your lucky day!), we present to you one of our personal favorite chapters. **

"Are you sure you don't need to go to the hospital?"

Sharon's reply was a patented Raydor glare, its vitriol diminished only slightly by the fact that she was cocooning her left hand in a wad of paper towels and dripping blood on the deputy chief's kitchen floor. "It's fine. Hand me another Band-Aid."

Brenda did more than that, carefully applying the bandage to the ugly slash marring the side of Sharon's index finger. Blood immediately soaked through the padding, staining it a dirty crimson. "That's the third one," Brenda pointed out.

"I think I should sit down," Sharon responded as if in answer to Brenda's comment, and the blonde unceremoniously shoved her into one of the chairs in the eating area. "This is fucking humiliating," the brunette grumbled, and despite herself Brenda emitted a yelp of laughter at hearing that word from her friend's lips.

"I blame my mama," Brenda retorted, which wasn't precisely true but garnered a pained smile from the other woman. It had, after all, been Willie Rae's suggestion that Brenda Leigh consider actually using her kitchen for cooking something more than mashed potatoes.

"You've finally unpacked," the older Johnson woman had said during their weekly phone call, and the deputy chief had briefly entertained the possibility that her mother was psychic and as such would be an asset to the LAPD. Then Willie Rae had added, "I can tell, because your voice isn't so echo-y. Now, are you puttin' that kitchen to good use?"

Willie Rae had long ago dismissed any fantasies of turning her daughter into a modern-day Betty Crocker, assuming she'd ever harbored any in the first place. But she knew said daughter liked to eat, and worried about both the expense and nutritional value of a diet consisting entirely of take-out.

"I don't really have time for cookin', Mama, or the patience. I'm tired and hungry when I get home from work."

"There are simple things you could make. Cookin' doesn't have to be a production, Brenda Leigh. What about that pasta dish Sharon made? You told me you liked that, and it sounded real simple."

_True_...

"I bet she has a few other things she could show you how to make too, honey. And the two of you have been spendin' a good bit of time together, haven't you? Why don't you ask her?"

Brenda had contemplated her mother's suggestion and decided it appealed to her on several different levels. First, she _had_ liked that pasta. Second, being able to prepare a few basic but reliable meals sounded like something the new and improved, single Brenda ought to know how to do. And finally, if she was being honest, it sounded like a nice, neutral thing she could do with her friend in the wake of last Friday night's rather - odd - experience at the pool table. The two women had encountered each other several times at work the following week, in the corridors and in the break room, and each time they'd stopped and chatted; but Sharon, who wasn't very good at disguising social awkwardness, had seemed a little uncomfortable, just a touch. If Brenda thought too hard about it, she was just a touch uncomfortable too.

Sharon had agreed readily to the deputy chief's suggestion via text message that she come over Friday night for an informal cooking lesson. Ever the efficient, organized captain, she had then emailed Brenda an itemized shopping list. What a few months ago would have annoyed the younger woman to no end only made her chuckle.

"Maybe you should elevate it," Brenda suggested now, anxiously, watching Sharon's blood soak through more paper towels.

"Oh, right," Sharon muttered, and did so, sluggishly. "Um, Brenda?" Her voice was uncharacteristically meek. "I think I might throw up."

Brenda's eyes widened. "I hope you don't..." she said worriedly, turning her back for a moment. She dumped the mixing bowl of chopped garlic, onions, and peppers onto the blood-stained chopping board, turning back to the table. She set the bowl in front of Sharon's pale face. "I'm happy to be that friend who holds your hair while you puke, but I can't guarantee that I won't throw up too." To demonstrate her friendly intentions, Brenda reached for Sharon's hair and was quickly swatted away by Sharon's uninjured hand.

The paper towel slipped, revealing the fact that the bleeding most definitely had not stopped. Sharon tipped her head back, sucking in great lungfuls of air, looking greener than ever.

"All right, that's it. Time to go to the doctor."

"I don't need to go to the hospital," Sharon snapped, her tone icy. She lifted her hand and grimaced as she focused fully on her cooking wound. "Okay. I need to go to the hospital."

Brenda helped the woman to her feet and rifled through a drawer for a clean dishtowel, replacing the sodden napkins. She pressed it to her friend's trembling hand. "There now. We'll get this fixed up in a jiffy."

"We'll be waiting in the emergency room for an eternity," Sharon commented with disapproval, lingering by the door while Brenda grabbed their purses, keys, and cell phones.

"No we won't. I'll just flash 'em my badge and hurry things along." They headed toward the stairwell, Brenda clinging to her friend's elbow as they steadily descended the staircase.

"This isn't official police business."

"Have you seen my kitchen? It looks like a crime scene!" Brenda forced a breathless chuckle, holding open the front door. "Look, I'm sorry about this..."

"It's fine," Sharon said, using that tone that indicated to Brenda that things were definitely _not_ fine.

The blonde worried her lip as she helped Sharon into the car. She'd never seen her so rattled before and found the sight of it more jarring than the stark red of the blood that had stained her purple blouse. Brenda had no idea that a finger could bleed so much and wondered if Sharon was anemic, finally deciding with the utmost tact that she'd leave the doctor to inquire about her iron intake instead.

"Really though," Brenda continued, sliding her key into the ignition. "If you wanted to play doctor this bad, all you had to do was ask. You didn't have to slice off your finger."

Sharon laughed meekly. "I didn't slice it off."

"Showin' off all fancy-like with your knives didn't do you any good," Brenda teased as she drove. "You didn't need to impress me."

Sharon winced, the sting of her cut distracting her momentarily. "Why? Have I already succeeded in impressing you?"

"Of course you have!" Brenda exclaimed, as if it should have been perfectly obvious.

"You know, you're not so great at flirting when you're worried." The brunette looked over at her when the car slowed at a red light. "It's just a little cut."

Sharon then made the mistake of looking down at said "little cut" and gulped loudly, clapping her uninjured hand over her mouth. "Pull over!" she exclaimed frantically. "Pulloverpullover!"

The other woman managed to comply, no easy feat in Los Angeles (although at least it wasn't rush hour), and cringed as she listened to the captain empty the contents of her stomach onto the roadside. After a moment Sharon sat up and slammed the door, no longer green but ghastly pale, and indelicately swiped the back of her left hand across her mouth. "Drive," she breathed. She was silent for the rest of the ride, in no frame of mind to make any more jokes about Brenda flirting.

The deputy chief insisted Sharon find a seat in the ER waiting room and let her deal with the desk staff, and for once the stubborn captain made no effort to protest. She was slumped against the wall in a dingy orange chair, her head tipped back and her eyes closed, when Brenda found her a few minutes later. Her pallor was enough to give Brenda, who had seen dying gunshot victims and corpses a-plenty and knew Sharon wasn't going to die of a cut finger, pause, and she spoke a little too loudly, eager to see those green eyes open.

"They said it'd be just a little while," she announced brightly.

"That's what they always say," Sharon retorted grimly, squinting at the clipboard Brenda held against her hip. "Here, give me that."

"I'll fill it out for you."

Sharon started to roll her eyes, but then thought better of it as her head swam.

"What, now you're ambidextrous?" The blonde sent a pointed look in the direction of Sharon's bloody right hand. "Besides, I bet I already know most of this stuff anyway," Brenda added.

The older woman shot her an exceedingly dubious look, momentarily distracted from the pain - it no longer seemed localized in her finger, but radiated hotly throughout her hand and up her arm - and, what was worse, the waves of nausea rolling over her.

The blonde was a little embarrassed to find herself stymied by the first item on the page, "full name." "Sharon Raydor?" she asked tentatively.

"Get my driver's license out of my wallet, and my insurance card," Sharon (make that Sharon Jane Raydor, d.o.b. September 12, 1957) suggested, and with those aids Brenda made it through the basic information section and flipped the page with a flourish.

"Okay, medical history. At what age did you experience the onset of menses?"

Sharon's eyes widened. "'The onset of menses'? That's not on there." Brenda tilted the clipboard toward her to exhibit the offending question, and the captain grumbled, "I'm not wearing my glasses."

"Well then, you'll have to take my word for it. So, at what age did you -"

"Make something up."

"Come on, Sharon."

"Twelve. I was twelve."

"An early bloomer." Filling in the blank, the blonde nodded sagaciously. "I shoulda known. Childhood illnesses?"

"I can't remember that far back; I'm too old."

"Why can you make jokes about your age, and I can't?" Brenda asked petulantly.

"Because it's _my_ age. Just check all the usual ones."

"Anythin' unusual?"

"I had the Bubonic plague in 1362."

"Major surgeries?"

"Lost a leg at Appomatox Courthouse."

Brenda Leigh sneered with disgust. "You are no help, Sharon Raydor."

"Like that's the first time I've heard that."

"I think you're gettin' punchy from blood loss. You want me to go get you a soda or somethin'?"

"Just finish the damn form, okay? What's next?"

"Sexual history."

"For a _cut finger_?" Sharon practically howled, drawing the attention of several other prospective patients waiting nearby.

"I don't think they have specific forms for individual ailments," Brenda pointed out wryly. "Can you imagine all the paperwork that would generate? The 'I ploughed my car into a telephone pole' form, the 'I have a mysterious rash' form, the 'I shot myself in the foot' form..."

"It would be just like working in IA," Sharon replied a little deliriously.

The younger woman arched an eyebrow, considering that sad state of (internal) affairs. "Sexual history," she repeated doggedly.

"Not applicable," Sharon grouchily instructed.

"There's no ticky box for that," Brenda replied. "Besides, you've had two babies, so unless you've only had sex just that once-"

"No, Brenda Leigh, I didn't. I happened to have a mostly satisfying sex life, thankyouverymuch."

"Happened? Is it over?"

Sharon huffed out a breath. "_No_."

"Hey, I didn't write the form. It wants to know if you're sexually active."

"Not at the moment."

"When was the last time?"

Sharon imperiously arched an eyebrow. "I know for a fact that's not on the form."

The blonde smiled impishly. "No, it's not. I was just curious...I bet it's been less time for you than it has for me." She paused. "Has it?"

"I have no idea, Brenda. Tell you what-when we get out of here, we can sync up our appointment books and compare notes. Maybe we can even figure out when we'll be cycling together."

"_Ha ha,_" Brenda quipped dryly. "So was that a yes or a no for bein' sexually active?"

"I don't know," Sharon replied, swallowing back a queasy tremor. Her tongue felt like sandpaper.

"I wonder how that works," the younger woman mused. "Do they think that when you've lost your virginity, some sorta switch is flipped on to signify that you're sexually active? Or does it depend on how often you _do it_?"

"Why don't you go ask someone?" Sharon hinted impatiently.

"I haven't finished this yet," Brenda said. "No STDs, right?"

Sharon narrowed her eyes.

"Okay-that's a no then."

There was a momentary lapse in conversation, for which Sharon was grateful. She listened to the stroke of the pen, assuming that Brenda had gone on to fill out the blank spaces that she actually knew the answers to. After another moment of silence, during which time Sharon could focus solely on the throbbing in her hand, she turned back to Brenda. "What are you writing now?"

"I'm fillin' my name in the emergency contact part."

"You're not-"

"Now listen," Brenda said, pointing a stern finger at her friend. "There are two spots here. I can put in whoever you want in the first spot, but I think I should be in the second one."

"I could be bleeding out from a gunshot wound and you could be ignoring your calls at a crime scene. How comforting."

"I wouldn't let you go through any of that alone."

Sharon's dour expression mellowed as she read the fierce sincerity in the other woman's chocolate-colored eyes. "All right," she said slowly. "Then you should put me down as your emergency contact too."

Brenda smiled. "I will," she agreed, touched. It had also just occurred to her that her ex-husband's name occupied the like place in her personnel file, and if Sharon wasn't up for the responsibility, she had no idea whose name she could put to replace Fritz's. Will's? Provenza's? The thought made her snort.

"What's funny?" Sharon asked faintly.

"Nothin'." Removing her reading glasses and tucking them into the neck of her cotton top, Brenda Leigh rose swiftly to her feet. "I'm gonna go see what's takin' so long."

The dark-haired woman subsided against the wall, for once in agreement with the deputy chief's characteristic impatience.

Brenda seemed to be gone a long time, although Sharon knew her idea of time was probably dilated, measured, as it was, by each slow throb of her right hand. She tried not to think of her daughter, which was worse than simply surrendering and letting the thoughts pour in; but Sharon didn't know how to process emotion without a struggle. Here she was, impatient and queasy because of a little cut on her finger. How had her baby girl's body been torn, mangled, miles away from any medical attention or a friendly face? What had she felt?

The brightest possibility was that she'd felt nothing at all.

Because Sharon's secret, a mother's secret, the one she carried silently in her heart, was the certainty that Vivien was dead.

Her eyes fell on the dark fluid staining the cheerful green and white dish towel wrapped around her offending finger, and she reeled.

"Sharon?"

Suddenly Brenda was beside her, crouching by her uncomfortable plastic chair, her features scrunched with anxiety. The older woman turned toward her, but it took her a few seconds to focus, blinking hazily.

"Blood loss," said another voice. "Don't worry. Come on, Ms. Raydor, and we'll get you fixed up. Do you need a wheelchair?"

Sharon had recovered enough to scowl, and she felt Brenda Leigh's sharp little fingers gripping her arm. "I'll help her," the blonde said quickly, knowing Sharon wouldn't suffer such an indignity unless she was on the point of death.

The resident who briskly jabbed the captain with a local anaesthetic and went about suturing up her finger was unusually cheerful and reminded Sharon of Daniel's boyfriend, Kai. "So what happened?"

Green eyes sliced into Brenda as surely as the knife had sliced into Sharon's finger, daring the younger woman to say anything. "Kitchen accident," the brunette replied briefly, her curious gaze never deviating from what the young man was doing to her finger. Brenda tried for a few seconds to watch, but her stomach roiled, and she quickly returned her focus to her friend's calm face.

"You really did a number on it." The doctor sounded half admiring, half disgusted. "I can refer you to a plastic surgeon, if you'd like."

Sharon's eyebrows crept toward her hairline. She was plainly unimpressed. "For my finger."

The doctor nodded. "You're gonna have a scar."

"And will it impede mobility? Function?" Sharon asked brusquely. At the negative shake of his head, Sharon rolled her eyes. "No, thank you." Her eyes found Brenda's across the small cubicle. "Los Angeles," the captain muttered. "Typical."

"You'd be surprised," the doctor continued, his fingers maneuvering the suturing needles with practised ease. "It _is_ L.A." He tied off the final stitch. "Seven stitches should do it. You'll want to keep this elevated and schedule an appointment to have these removed."

Sharon nodded as he wrapped her finger in gauze, instructing her in how she should care for and clean the cut. She noted that as he spoke, he divided his eye contact between both women in the curtained off area. Brenda nodded dutifully, eyeing Sharon sternly as if to imply that she'd clean the cut herself if necessary.

Exhaustion and weariness settled heavily over the captain. She thought longingly of her bed, of soft billowy blankets and the blissful emptiness of sleep. She allowed herself to be steered through the emergency room, grateful for Brenda's silence. The press of Brenda's fingers on her waist was entirely comforting and unsettling, but she said nothing, deferring for once the care and responsibility of her well-being. She couldn't recall the last time she'd allowed someone else to look after her-had she even allowed Paul to act as caregiver, or had that role always been hers alone? She was testing unfamiliar waters; whether or not she could blame it on the blood loss, Sharon ruefully admitted to herself that she liked it.

"Let's get you home," Brenda said, buckling the captain's seat belt for her. She tucked Sharon's purse onto the floor beside her feet, pausing for a moment to brush back a stray lock of the older woman's hair that had fallen across her brow.

Sharon blinked into the darkness of the parking garage as Brenda rounded the front of the car, observing her with detached interest as Brenda slid into the driver's seat. "My car is at your house," she mumbled.

"Don't you worry about that. I'll bring it over in the mornin'. We're gonna get you into some clean clothes, make you some soup, and get you into bed."

"I don't think I'm comfortable with you in my kitchen."

Brenda chuckled. "Even I cannot screw up Campbell's. You need somethin' on your stomach. And don't you even think of arguin' with me or I'll handcuff you to the chair and spoon feed you myself."

Sharon smiled. "All right, mom."

"So much for cookin' lessons," the blonde said with a wistful sigh. "I'm really sorry, Sharon."

"These things happen."

"I don't like seein' you hurt. You scared me." Brenda caught her eye when she slowed for a red light. "Don't do that again, okay?"

"I have no plans for a repeat performance."

"Good."

Sharon dozed during the remainder of the drive, her head slumped against the cool glass of the window. She was disoriented when she awoke to find Brenda rifling through her purse for her keys, and found it stranger yet when Brenda was all hands when she helped her to the door. But it was just as well. To her mortification, Sharon felt her legs tremble beneath her. Some big, bad-ass policewoman she was, felled by a knife wound incurred while chopping an onion, just as she'd sternly said to Brenda Leigh, "Now, be careful not to hold the knife this way, because you'll cut yourself."

She hadn't intended her demonstration of the wrong chopping technique to be quite so thorough, but she still wasn't sure why the younger woman was being so apologetic. It wasn't like _she_ had sliced into Sharon's finger; she had only her own stupidity to blame.

Brenda's hip bumped hers, jostling her, as they stepped over the threshold into Sharon's darkened house. Sharon sucked in a quick breath.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did I hurt you?"

Sharon didn't answer. Her heart was beating rapidly and she was pretty sure the Tylenol with codeine had finally kicked in.

"You sit down." Brenda bumped around the living room until she located a reading lamp and switched it on. "I'll go make the soup. - Or do you _have_ anything as plebeian as canned soup?"

Sharon smiled tiredly. "In the cabinet to the right of the trash can."

Brenda disappeared into the kitchen and immediately began to make an ungodly racket, but Sharon didn't sit down. She had only one coherent thought: clean clothes, and clean hands. An R.N. had carefully cleaned her wounded hand, but the left was still spattered with blood, and she felt filthy. A hot shower sounded heavenly, but also like way too much effort, given the strict orders she'd received not to get her stitches wet.

She kicked off her shoes just inside the door, where she'd probably trip over them later, perhaps necessitating a return visit to the emergency room, and padded down the hallway to her bedroom. She flipped the overhead light on with her 'good' hand, the right one still elevated - not only was her shoulder beginning to throb like a son of a bitch from the strain, but she felt like an idiot, like she was constantly waiting for the teacher to call on her - opened the closet door, and realized she had a problem.

_Buttons_.

"Okay," she muttered under her breath with a sigh, glad that at least she wasn't wearing a blazer. The blouse shouldn't be that difficult to manage one-handed, but the jeans would be harder. Still, she assured herself, she could do it, as long as she retained her patience and moved slowly.

And she did, very carefully working the cotton blouse, formerly purple, over her injured hand, and sitting on the edge of the bed to peel her jeans and socks down her legs.

She got distracted, though, by the realization that she had a more serious problem.

_Hooks._

Bra hooks, to be precise.

She thought briefly of just leaving the thing on and worrying about it later, but then imagined spending the entire weekend trapped in her Victoria's Secret brassiere - not even one of her really good ones, but one of the second-stringers she kept for days when she needed to do laundry, a basic, no-frills white number that was slightly dingy around the edges. Sleeping in it, showering in it: the images would've been laughable if her hand hadn't begun to throb again and she didn't feel quite so much like sobbing from exhaustion and embarrassment.

And then a voice called out, "Soup's on. Sharon?"

Quick, graceless footsteps pounded down the hall. "Sharon, why aren't you restin'? Are you okay?"

Sharon sighed heavily, a movement that elongated every fatigued muscle in her body. Her back was to the doorway, but she knew Brenda was standing there now, uncertain whether she should blithely blunder in or apologize and retreat, given the other woman's state of undress. Her hesitation somehow made this worse.

"I think," Sharon pronounced gravely and with great dignity, "I need some help, chief."

"All right. I'm comin' in," Brenda announced, pausing for a moment to allow Sharon a moment to do-whatever she may have needed to do. Sharon sat, lethargic and heavy, on the edge of the bed and waited.

For reasons that Brenda could not understand, she blushed immediately upon seeing Sharon's shirtless back. She took a quiet, deep breath, hoping to force the color from her cheeks before she brightly said, "Where do you keep your pajamas?"

"Top drawer on the right," Sharon replied, gesturing faintly with a tilt of her head toward the large dresser. It was curious to see Brenda so awkward as she crossed the distance of the room to rifle through her things, her head firmly pointed away from her. Brenda's shyness about Sharon's partial nudity only made Sharon burn hotter with embarrassment. She huffed impatiently.

Brenda quickly apologized, grabbing a pair of linen pajama bottoms and a Disneyland t-shirt. She hid a smirk, trying to imagine the older woman posing with Mickey Mouse and two small children or, perhaps, her granddaughter. The shirt was worn and soft, which was why she chose it. Whenever she felt unwell or down, she often opted for the comfort of her rattiest, oldest pajamas. "This all right?" she asked, holding up her selection.

Sharon nodded.

Brenda came quietly to the bed, taking up the t-shirt. She gathered the fabric in her hands and slipped it over Sharon's head, allowing it to drape loosely over her chest. She cleared her throat, hoping that her attempt at preserving Sharon's dignity would be appreciated, and reached around to unclasp her bra.

"Jesus, Brenda, your hands are freezing."

Brenda fumbled the strap, grazing her knuckles against Sharon's back. "If I'd realized I was givin' you the full treatment, I'd have warmed them up beforehand." She took up the strap again with earnest, quickly parting the hooks from the eyes. She stayed close like this, looking down at the smooth expanse of her shoulders, the little dips of her spine, the sparse freckles decorating her back. She hadn't realized until now just how _warm_ Sharon was, how she radiated body heat. Focusing on this and not on the fact that she was about to take off Sharon Raydor's bra, Brenda slipped the straps from her shoulders. She discarded the bra on the floor and, taking great pains to avoid accidentally seeing something she wasn't meant to, she guided Sharon's arms through the short sleeves of the shirt and pulled it down over her torso.

"There now," Brenda said, kneeling down before her. "Askin' for help isn't so bad, is it?"

Sharon shrugged her shoulders noncommittally, and Brenda realized that she was blushing. She much preferred this look to the sickly pallor that had previously stained her cheeks.

There was no way for Brenda to take off Sharon's jeans and maintain her modesty, so Brenda simply reached for the button and snapped it open, careful to keep her knuckles from brushing against the skin of her stomach. Still, she felt the tense flutter of the other woman's abdominal muscles as she carefully began to peel the fabric down, trying to touch her as little as possible, but 'as little as possible' turned out to be quite a bit when you were divesting someone of skin-tight denim. The captain was warm here too, all soft skin and strong muscle, and good Lord, had Brenda realized Sharon's legs were this long? She wasn't that much taller than Brenda herself, but her legs went on for yards. Fascinated, the blonde reached out and placed her open palm on Sharon's knee, and when she realized what she'd done they both jumped. Brenda emitted a strangled, startled little laugh and Sharon said, "Careful, don't scratch yourself - I didn't bother shaving today."

The fine stubble on that smooth flesh wasn't what Brenda's thoughts had been focused on, and she felt her cheeks heat. She grabbed blindly for the pajama bottoms she'd selected, and Sharon obediently stepped into them as quickly as possible. When Brenda had skimmed the fabric up past her knees, Sharon's right hand covered hers.

"Thanks," she mumbled hastily. "I can take it from here."

Brenda popped to her feet as if her shoes had springs in them and nodded energetically. "Okay. I'll just go check on the soup."

That, she thought as she scampered down the hall, had been a stupid thing to say, because there wasn't much "checking" involved in heating up a can of Campbell's finest tomato, but at least it had gotten her out of near proximity to a barely-clothed Sharon Raydor. And then despite herself, as she lackadaisically stirred the hot soup to keep it from sticking or forming that unpleasant film on top, Brenda wondered just _why_ they'd both been so uncomfortable. No matter what her boys might think of her, the deputy chief knew she wasn't a prude; and Sharon didn't strike her as one either. Not only had Sharon given birth to two children - which, although Brenda's knowledge was limited, she thought entailed showing the most intimate parts of your anatomy to a variety of concerned strangers - but the two of them had had that vibrator conversation a while back. Maybe, Brenda thought, unconvinced, that was what happened when you weren't having someone regularly see you naked. You got all jumpy about it.

"Do you think your culinary skills extend to making a grilled cheese to go with that?" Sharon asked in that wry tone of hers as she shuffled into the kitchen, her feet now covered in thick gray wool socks.

"Absolutely," the younger woman chirped brightly. "You've gotta keep your strength up, what with all that blood loss."

Sharon cringed as she flopped down at her kitchen table. "Your kitchen's a mess, Brenda. I'm sorry."

The blonde shrugged it off. "You think I can call in one of those cleanin' crews that do crime scenes?" she teased.

"I often wonder the same thing after Clarissa spends the weekend here," the captain retorted, and then her expression transformed to one of dismay. "Oh, _shit_. Clarissa."

"What about her?" Brenda asked, immediately concerned, as she looked over her shoulder from her perusal of the cheese and meat drawer of Sharon's refrigerator. Of course the woman didn't have Kraft singles; apparently Brenda was expected to hack away at the block of sharp cheddar.

Sharon's shoulders had slumped - or at least her left shoulder had slumped. There wasn't much she could do with her right, since she'd propped her elbow on the back of the chair beside her to take the strain off her muscles as she continued to 'elevate.' "This is my weekend with her. Normally I pick her up after work on Fridays, but since you asked me to come over, I told Paul I'd get her in the morning. I'm not foolish enough to think I can keep up with a very active two-year-old with this thing." She jerked her chin at her hand, disgusted. "I'll have to call and cancel. I hope they don't have plans."

Brenda bit her lower lip. Her friend looked even more dejected than she had earlier that evening as they'd waited in the ER. Briefly she considered suggesting that Sharon call her son and ask if he was free to do the heavy-lifting involved in caring for a toddler, but reconsidered. Sharon had voluntarily shortened her time with her granddaughter to do a favor for Brenda, and that was what had led to this whole mess. There seemed to be only one obvious solution.

"You don't have to cancel. I'll help you."

The older woman looked as though she were about to object, had even puckered her lips to form the words, but then her face softened. "All right. That would be nice."

Brenda grinned. "I'm lookin' forward to meetin' her." She unwrapped the block of cheese, dropping it onto the chopping block, and reached for a knife.

A sense of deja vu washed over Sharon as if she'd been doused with cold water. "Wait!" She pointed to the drawer beside Brenda's hip. "I have a slicer in there."

The blonde chuckled and reached into the drawer for the aforementioned cheese slicer. "Are you worried about little ol' me?"

"If you follow my lead, you'll be on your own getting to the hospital."

Brenda moved about Sharon's kitchen with easy familiarity, pulling out bread and butter and a frying pan without having to stop and ask for directions. It made Sharon feel warm inside, made her feel like Brenda had somehow managed to belong there, like a permanent fixture. It no longer seemed surreal that Brenda had become an integral part of her personal life; it simply felt _good_.

"You're not so bad in a kitchen," Sharon pondered after a moment of watching Brenda simultaneously stir the soup and check the heat of the frying pan.

The blonde smiled over her shoulder before setting the first grilled cheese onto the moderately heated pan, listening to its sizzle with satisfaction. "I lived on grilled cheese in college. It's the more difficult stuff that I have trouble with." She twisted her mouth in consideration. "No-it's the other stuff I don't have the patience for."

"Because you want everything right away without having to do the work."

"I don't mind doin' the work-"

"When you know it won't be done right if someone else does it for you." Sharon smirked at Brenda's arched eyebrow. "Perhaps your next bad batch of take-out will motivate you to try again...without the bloodshed."

"Don't curse my take-out!" Brenda shrieked, wielding her spatula in the brunette's direction. She turned back to the grilled cheese, flipping the sandwich to cook on the other side. The top slice was a perfect golden brown, and Brenda let out a relieved breath. She would never have lived down the humiliation of ruining grilled cheese-ever. Allowing it a moment to cook, Brenda set about retrieving two bowls, spoons, and a ladle for the soup. "There now-dinner's just about ready. You're not gonna throw up again, are you?"

Sharon shook her head, her thick hair framing her face. "I'll warn you if I do."

"Good." She moved the sandwich onto a little plate and cut it in half diagonally, just like her mama used to do for her lunch every day. She ladled out a bowl of soup and carefully set everything in front of Sharon, placing out cutlery and an unasked-for glass of water.

"I wouldn't have pegged you for the natural caretaker," Sharon replied, mystified. She paid little attention to the other woman as she started the second grilled cheese, focusing instead on her now-ravenous hunger.

"I'm not. I'm really not." Brenda kept her back to the other woman as a wave of emotion clouded her features. "It's nice to be needed though."

Sharon considered as she moved the deliciously gloppy melted cheese around in her mouth. She couldn't quite bring herself to say that it was nice to need someone; but still, maybe it was. And if not exactly that, then it was definitely nice to know there was someone there in case Sharon did need her. The thought made her smirk into her tomato soup. Who would ever have imagined that that person would be _Brenda Leigh Johnson_?

"Well," she said aloud, "you'll get your fair share of being needed this weekend, I promise. Even very independent toddlers require a lot of attention."

"Your granddaughter is very independent? _What_ a shock."

"Like her mother," Sharon commented, and then was quiet a moment. Brenda sat down opposite her with her own sandwich and bowl of soup, the fare doing much to transport her back to her days of living in the dorms. She imagined how her life might have been different if she and Sharon Raydor had become good friends in college, the kind who sat together on a quiet night in, eating grilled cheese and talking about life and all the possibilities that seem so vast when you're on the threshold of everything.

"You know, Brenda, I really appreciate your offer to help, but are you sure you know what you're getting yourself into?" Sharon asked cautiously, interrupting her reverie.

"I'm a fast learner," the deputy chief responded blithely.

"Maybe I should at least call Paul and see if Clarissa can just spend the day, and go home in the evening."

Brenda frowned fiercely. "Don't you dare!" she exclaimed. "Don't disturb your usual routine. If she usually stays overnight, then she's stayin' overnight. We'll have a slumber party." She took a first, heavenly bite of her own sandwich and let bliss wash over her, relishing it for a moment before smiling brightly. "Besides, I'm a deputy chief of the LAPD. I solve homicides for a livin'. I interview leaders of drug cartels and hardened bangers. How much trouble can one little girl possibly be?"

Sharon said nothing, but watched her friend with wide, grave eyes that suggested she had serious doubts about the proposition, and that Brenda Leigh might very well be eating her words rather than grilled cheese for tomorrow night's dinner.


	10. Chapter 10

**Title: Since You Went Away - Chapter Ten: Bringing Up Baby**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Pairing: Brenda/Sharon**

**Rating: K+ (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 8337**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: You like us, you really like us! That is awesome - you are all awesome - and we are thrilled to find that we actually have so many loyal readers. Here's to you. Read on to see whether Brenda Leigh has finally met her match in the littlest Raydor.**

Brenda Leigh drummed her fingers nervously against the steering wheel of Sharon's car and chewed the inside of her cheek, unattractively pulling her lips aside to allow her better access to indulge in her nervous habit. She took a deep breath as she glanced at the sign indicating that she was about to turn onto Sharon's road, briefly considering turning around and high-tailing it home. But she wouldn't do that-she would never break a promise to Sharon-and so she turned onto the quiet street and navigated the car into the driveway.

She knew that it was completely irrational to be so apprehensive about meeting a child who was not even two years old, but Brenda felt an absurd amount of pressure. It was one thing to have briefly met Daniel, who had already established a faint mistrust and disapproval of her (or, at least, of Deputy Chief Johnson), but it was quite another to start anew with a little girl. She'd always felt that young children were untempered, quick studies of character. They were too young to have any rational opinions on how they felt about a person. They either liked you or they didn't, and Brenda wondered just how much of a song and dance she would have to put on to sway the toddler's opinion in her favor.

Deciding to leave her overnight bag in the car, Brenda finally decided that if she could face rapists and murders on a daily basis, she could most certainly face Clarissa.

Sharon opened the door after one sturdy knock, her hand elevated in a faux wave, which Brenda cheekily returned with a brisk wiggle of her fingers. The captain looked much better today, her color restored and her dissatisfied scowl replaced by a pleasant smile. Whether Clarissa liked her or not, the child certainly did wonders for Sharon's disposition.

"I thought you might stay in the car all morning," Sharon remarked, allowing Brenda to sweep inside the house. "Don't tell me you're nervous."

She dropped the keys into Sharon's palm. "Me? Nervous? About a kid?" She guffawed and Sharon almost bought it. Wide brown eyes scanned what little she could see of the living room. "Feelin' better?"

"It hurts like a bi-" Sharon smirked, throwing a cautious glance toward the living room. "It _hurts_."

"And how's the little one?"

Before Brenda could find out just how the child was faring on that beautiful, sunny morning, Clarissa burst into the foyer with a spring in her step, careening toward Sharon's legs. She curled her little arms around one of Sharon's calves and stared up at her, her large green eyes sparkling with curiosity. "Cee, this is our friend, Brenda. Can you say hi?"

They both looked down expectantly at the child and Brenda held her breath, smiling down at the precious girl. She looked exactly like she imagined Sharon had at her age, her head covered in a tumble of dark brown curls. Brenda waved at Clarissa, waiting for her cue. The child stared for a moment and then grinned, proudly showing off her collection of tiny white teeth, and proceeded to shyly hide her face in Sharon's leg.

The child didn't show any immediate signs of moving, so Brenda addressed Sharon in a low voice. "So Paul was okay with you takin' her with your hand hurt?"

"Not exactly," Sharon replied in the same low voice, shooting the other woman a meaningful look. More loudly she asked, "Cee! Where's Flopsy?"

Suddenly stunned, the toddler looked up at her grandmother with perfectly round eyes and mouth, and then careened back the way she had come. Sharon watched her go and then explained, "Grandpa Paul would've been fine with it, but Grandma Helen would've freaked out, so I made Daniel our co-conspirator. He picked her up and brought her over here."

Brenda grinned crookedly. "So I guess adult kids are good for somethin' once in a while."

"Once in a while," Sharon agreed. "He has an all-day bio lab today, but it was all I could do to get him to go. I thought I was going to have to call you and put him on the phone so you could tell him you were really coming over here."

The blonde looked worried. "I wasn't late, was I?"

"No. My son is always early."

Brenda sniffed. "How surprising. Well, I guess I can't blame Daniel for thinkin' I might not be entirely trustworthy."

Sharon waved that off. "Come on in. You want a cup of coffee?"

"I'd love one," replied the younger woman, who still wasn't totally sure how she felt about being awake, showered, clothed, and out of her house at 8:00 on a Saturday morning when she didn't have to work.

"You'll need it, to keep up with her. Whatcha doin', munchkin?" Sharon called as they walked past the door of the living room. The child sprawled in the middle of the rug gabbled out an answer Brenda couldn't decipher, although Sharon nodded sagely, and then Clarissa held up a ragged stuffed rabbit clad in a green dress.

"Flopsy," Sharon explained, smiling. "Her constant companion. She was Vivvy's."

Clarissa flashed them a triumphant grin and scrambled to her feet. "Nana," she announced loudly, and at first Brenda thought she was calling Sharon by name, and wondered if there was a tactful way to suggest a change of grandmotherly titles. Surely Sharon Raydor wasn't anyone's "Nana"?

"In the kitchen," Sharon replied. "Come on."

Brenda thought her friend was summoning her to retrieve the promised coffee and turned obediently, but Clarissa bounded toward them with that peculiar jog-trot all toddlers master, dragging Flopsy by one ear, and after a few more seconds Brenda realized the toddler was being called into the kitchen to eat the banana she'd just requested.

Brenda frowned. Clearly she had a few things to learn. It was lucky she'd always been good with riddles.

When she entered the kitchen, Brenda observed the little girl dancing around Sharon's ankles while the captain cut up a banana with a butter knife. She nearly laughed at the domesticity, having never been able to _really_ see Sharon playing this role. Now that she was observing it with her own eyes, Brenda couldn't imagine Sharon _not_ playing this part.

"Will you put her in her chair?" Sharon asked, nodding toward the highchair by the table.

Brenda's eyes were saucers when she looked down at the wiggling child and then at the chair, trying to imagine how she'd pull this off without actually touching her. Sharon chuckled to see the look of alarm on her face as she dumped the bananas into a bright blue plastic bowl.

"Come on now, Brenda Leigh. This _is_ what you signed up for, after all."

"Right." Taking a fortifying breath, Brenda came up alongside Clarissa, hoping that the child would at least make eye contact before she up and grabbed her.

"She doesn't bite," Sharon prompted. She paused and amended her statement: "Well, not anymore-most of the time. I make no promises about what may happen if you put your finger near her mouth. I think she's learning to reciprocate after nearly two years of playful toe-biting."

Brenda forced a laugh and finally reached down to grab Clarissa, cradling her legs with her other arm as she swept her over toward the highchair. For good measure, Brenda threw in a few exaggerated noises and, to her surprise and immense satisfaction, Clarissa giggled.

She made quick work of the little buckles in the chair that would keep the child from tumbling out headfirst before snapping on the tray. Sharon busied herself pouring the coffee and Brenda noticed with a giddy surge of appreciation that Sharon had remembered the honey that she so liked. A grin on her face, Brenda reached for the bowl of diced fruit.

"Uh..." Brenda began, looking at the toddler's outstretched hands. "How does this work? Do I feed it to her or does she do it herself?"

Sharon snorted. "She can feed herself."

Relieved, Brenda set the bowl in front of Clarissa and watched the toothy, beaming smile break over the girl's face as she reached little fingers into the bowl to retrieve a banana cube. She inspected it for a moment before bringing it to her mouth.

"She's adorable," Brenda announced after a few moments of watching this repeated cycle. "Just the cutest lil thing!"

Sharon set down Brenda's mug of coffee before turning back to retrieve her own. "She's won you over already? I expected it to take at least until noon."

"How can you _not_ adore her? Look at those teeny little fingers and those gigantic eyes..." Brenda bit her lip. She gave a wistful sigh.

"If you start singing 'Baby Love', I _will_ shoot you."

Brenda arched an eyebrow. "You're the one who apparently liked this enough to have two," she pointed out, and Sharon rolled her eyes.

"It's not like the drive thru, you know, Brenda. You don't get to place an order. It runs in families."

Brenda looked askance. "Havin' kids?"

"Having_ twins_." Sharon wet a washcloth and handed it to the other woman. "You're going to need that."

Looking back at Clarissa, Brenda immediately agreed. Somehow a few banana cubes seemed to have found their way into the little girl's hair and onto her chin. She looked to her friend for guidance, as unsure of how to go about cleaning a toddler as she would have been if she were tasked with bathing a baby elephant.

"You can let her finish first." Sharon lowered herself into another chair and twisted her torso so she could rest her right elbow along the back and still keep her hand elevated. She emitted a small groan of relief.

The blonde frowned. "You know, you're probably doin' too much. You should be lettin' me do the things like cut up her bananas."

"There will be enough for you to do, I promise."

They sat in comfortable silence for several minutes, sipping their coffee while Clarissa ate her banana. Eventually Clarissa started to sing to herself, apparently at ease with her audience, and Sharon reached for the bright blue bowl. "All finished, honey? What do we do with the rest?"

Clarissa's song trailed off and she looked at the banana cubes left in the bowl, and then up into her grandmother's face, before darting a series of quick, hesitant glances at Brenda and finally returning her gaze to the less intimidating prospect of Sharon's face. "_Share_," she whispered, and then dissolved into giggles.

"That's right, we _share_."

Brenda smothered a huge grin in her coffee cup, delighted to see that stone-cold bitch, Captain Raydor, in full-on mommy mode.

Clarissa was now fascinated by Sharon's bandaged finger, staring at it with a sort of awe. She looked at Brenda, pointing at her grandmother's hand. "It's hurt," she announced clearly, with a sort of conspiratorial solemnity.

Brenda responded with an exaggerated nod, thinking that maybe dealing with toddlers was sort of like acting everything out in pantomime. "That's right, sweetie. So you and I are gonna help grandma out today, aren't we?"

"I help." With that same ponderous solemnity, the child carefully selected one of the remaining banana pieces in the bowl, grasped it between a chubby thumb and forefinger, and held it up toward Sharon's mouth.

"Oh, thank you, Cee," the brunette said with a wryness intended for Brenda's ears, but she leaned forward and accepted the slightly mashed treat.

"I help," Cee reiterated proudly, and grabbed another banana morsel. She lurched forward with this one, and Brenda realized it was intended for her.

"Honey, I'm not sure our friend Brenda likes -"

But Brenda was already gamely leaning forward to meet Clarissa halfway. When she had chewed and swallowed she said, "Helpin' _and_ sharin' - Sharon, you didn't tell me your granddaughter was such a smart little girl."

Clarissa beamed and let Brenda go to work with the washcloth, chirping, "Sticky sticky sticky!"

"Hey," Brenda began suddenly, thinking of what Sharon had said earlier, "are there other sets of twins in your family?"

The older woman paused in the act of lifting her coffee cup to her mouth, looking at her friend with surprise. "I have a twin."

Brenda's jaw dropped. "Well, for heaven's sake! You mean there are _two_ of you roamin' around on the loose?"

Brenda wondered exactly when she'd become so fond of the smirk that now quirked the other woman's lips. "Not exactly," Sharon chuckled. "We're fraternal, not identical. And I look much better in a skirt."

Before she could elaborate, the youngest member of their little trio let out a strident howl. "Out out out!" she cried, squirming wildly against the highchair's restraints.

"I've got this," Brenda declared with great confidence, only half of it feigned, and Sharon grinned. Her hands weren't as quick with the buckles and snaps as Sharon's would have been, but Brenda had the advantage of having the use of all ten fingers, and she managed. As soon as Clarissa's bare feet hit the kitchen floor, she was off and running.

"She's very energetic," Brenda commented mildly, and Sharon snickered. "It's such a nice day. You think maybe we should take her out to play, to the park or somewhere?"

The dark-haired woman drained the last of her coffee and smiled. "I think that is exactly what we should do, Brenda Leigh."

The park wasn't too busy, allowing them to select the much-coveted patch of grass beneath the shade of a large tree that was a reasonable distance from the playground. Brenda busied herself with laying out the blanket, pinning down the corners with the diaper bag and the picnic basket, occasionally stumbling when she realized Clarissa was close on her heels. Sharon looked on in amusement.

"I think she's smitten," the captain announced, sitting down on the wide plaid blanket.

"I doubt that," Brenda replied, rounding the blanket to sit beside Sharon. Clarissa followed closely behind, depositing herself on the blanket so close to Brenda that she was nearly on her lap.

Sharon raised a knowing eyebrow.

"Is she usually this..._friendly_?" Brenda asked, peering down at the little girl with hesitant, curious eyes.

"Sometimes. She is selectively shy, but when she decides she likes you, she devotes herself completely." Sharon leaned her right arm back against the stroller. "I'm surprised she's as trusting as she is, actually, given her separation from her mother."

Brenda looked at Sharon sympathetically, wondering if she should ask about the circumstances surrounding Clarissa's parentage and upbringing. When Sharon didn't volunteer any further information, she decided not to pry, choosing instead to observe as Clarissa crawled over to the edge of the blanket and ran her fingers through the grass. "What do you two usually do on your weekends together?"

"This, mostly. We color and watch movies and play...whatever happens to strike Cee's fancy." She looked at Brenda with a smile. "All very fascinating to you, I'm sure."

"It is, actually. I like seein' this side of you. You're much more relaxed than I would've figured."

"How so?"

"I dunno...I guess I imagined you as that stern type of grandmother who gets all miffed when you get grass stains on your bum and makes you eat your vegetables before you can leave the table." Brenda laughed, slightly flustered. "Guess I pictured Grandma Raydor, not Grandma Sharon."

"I'm certainly more relaxed with Clarissa than I was with the twins."

"Have you gotten wise in your old age?"

Sharon rolled her eyes. "You could say that. It was a different time. Circumstances are different now."

Brenda studied the woman's face, wondering if Sharon was leaving open a door for Brenda to inquire about said circumstances. Before she could pursue it, Clarissa turned back to them, holding out her little fist to Brenda. "For me?" she asked.

Clarissa nodded and stared at her expectantly.

"Hold out your hand, Brenda Leigh," Sharon prompted teasingly.

When Brenda did as Sharon said, Clarissa dumped a fistful of grass onto Brenda's palm. To her credit, Brenda gave the impression of being thrilled. "Look at all this! What should we do with it?" She shared a conspiratorial grin with the toddler and then, before she gave herself time to reconsider, she sprinkled the grass over Sharon's head.

Predictably, that was a big hit with Cee, and Cee's grandmother smiled good-naturedly but pointed out, "You know you're going to be the one picking every single blade out, right?"

"Right," Brenda agreed, and to her credit, she laughed heartily when she felt a like shower of grass raining down on her on curls.

"Why don't you take her over to the playground before she kills all the grass?" Sharon suggested.

Wide brown eyes blinked back at her. "Me?"

"I can come too."

"No no no." Brenda pushed firmly against Sharon's shoulder as the older woman shifted to hoist herself to her feet. "You relax. I am excellent on the playground."

Sharon's low voice drifted after her on the spring breeze: "Oh, I just bet you are."

Brenda Leigh felt that warm green gaze on her as she pushed Clarissa in one of the toddler swings, the little girl's gleeful shrieks piercing the air as she urged on her new friend Brenda. The blonde was still adjusting to the concept that someone she considered both a good friend and, basically, a contemporary could be anybody's grandmother. It sounded so _old_ - and, jokes about medieval scourges and Civil War battles aside, no one would dare call Sharon Raydor old. She was vital and vibrant, with her nimble mind, homecoming queen hair, and - well, and those acres of long, toned legs Brenda had seen up-close and personally last night. Brenda tried to think back to her earliest memories of her own maternal grandmother, and conjured up twinkling blue eyes and a halo of silver-white hair, much like Willie Rae looked now. And yet when Brenda was Clarissa's age, her Meemaw would've been - what, 55? Just a few months older than Sharon, in fact.

Brenda looked back to where her friend sprawled on the blanket, the breeze ruffling her long honey-brown layers, those long legs pulled up to her chest so she could rest her right arm atop her knees, and felt herself grin. Times had certainly changed if Sharon personified what it meant these days to be grandmotherly. But then, Brenda Leigh was quite sure that Sharon, like herself, had spent a lifetime defying conventions and expectations.

She found herself musing on what Sharon had been like as a child-if she was always this logical and serious or if she ever made mud pies and jumped in puddles. Was Sharon a tomboy, like she herself had been? She couldn't picture that; in Brenda's mind, Sharon Raydor was probably prom queen-and perhaps also in the honor band or on the debate team. What had she been like as a teenager? Was she dark and broody or rebellious? When _had_ Sharon lost her virginity? What had she wanted to be when she grew up?

Other curiosities mingled amongst these, leaving Brenda to create a timeline's worth of possibilities that ranged from what Sharon was like in college and when she had met her ex husband to what she had been like as an expectant mother. Standing here behind the newest generation of the Raydor clan made Brenda hunger for more knowledge about her but, more importantly, made her feel like she somehow had earned the right to know these things. She had, after all, been invited into their lives and had, against all reason, become Sharon's emergency contact. It didn't get better than that. Well-aside from sex and dating, but as far as friendships went, they were practically best friends. She laughed, imagining miniature versions of themselves sitting together in a sandbox, drinking apple juice boxes and exchanging friendship bracelets.

Brenda looked over at Sharon, cool and calm and radiant, and beamed. She stopped the swing and pointed to her. "Lookie, Clarissa - wave hello to grandma!" And they did, flapping their arms as if Sharon would only notice if they dislocated their shoulders in the process. Brenda and Clarissa shared a private smile when Sharon waved back.

"Swide!" the child announced and, after translating baby-speak, Brenda realized that she meant 'slide.'

She helped the little girl out of the swing, hoping that Sharon had looked away when she caught the toddler's shoe in the swing's foot hole. They ambled together toward the slide and, after an older boy took his turn, Brenda sat Clarissa on the slide and guided her down the slope. They clapped and cheered and for the first time since Charlie had gone home, Brenda felt like maybe she wasn't so bad with kids after all.

They played for a short while, bouncing between various playground apparatuses as they suited the young girl's fleeting attention span. When her back began to make its disapproval known after helping Clarissa down the slide for the eighth time, Brenda suggested they return to the Keeper of Juice and Gummy Snacks.

On their way back, Clarissa stopped several times to pluck long blades of grass from various bushes and, to Brenda's horror, uprooted a daisy from the decorative garden at the playground's edge. Clarissa looked so pleased with herself, her eyes so full of pride and excitement, that Brenda immediately forgave her.

"What's this?" Sharon asked with just the right amount of awe when Clarissa presented the flower. "Is this for me?"

Cee nodded, her mop of curls flopping everywhere.

Sharon sniffed the flower and bopped Clarissa on the nose with it. "It's very pretty," she announced, giving her granddaughter a kiss on the forehead.

Brenda knelt down beside them. Would it be inappropriate to ask for a kiss of such approval since she had, after all, been Clarissa's accomplice?

"Tell me, Brenda," Sharon began, picking off the flower's long stem so she could tuck the flower behind Brenda's ear. "What does the daisy symbolize?"

"It means innocence," Brenda replied, her cheeks blooming with color, "and loyal love."

"Well then," Sharon murmured looking from her friend to her granddaughter and back, "it couldn't be more appropriate, could it?" She smiled her Gioconda smile, her eyes far away, and Brenda dimpled with shy pleasure as she readjusted the flower. In that moment she felt that she was very much part of the club, the inner circle.

"And Clarissa decided to pick the flower herself." The captain laughed. "Vivien would be so pleased."

Brenda pondered as she accepted the slightly warm gummy snack the toddler held out to her, a bit more enthusiastic about sharing this treat than she had been about the mashed banana. She chewed slowly, rummaging around until she encountered a fragment of memory from a college English class. "You mean like Clarissa Dalloway, in the book?" Her eyes fell upon the squirming child. "Is that why -?"

Sharon nodded. "It was Vivien's favorite."

Brenda smiled - naming her child after a literary character seemed like something Sharon Raydor's daughter would do - and then her smile froze as she registered something else. She let her eyes fall to the blanket, hoping Sharon was too distracted by Cee's efforts to shove an entire handful of gummy fruits into her little mouth to have noticed.

_It was Vivien's favorite_, Sharon had said. _Was_, speaking of her daughter in the past tense.

Brenda Leigh felt a chill seep into her bones and focused on the vibrant child happily drinking apple juice, now, and the specter of death again receded to a manageable distance.

"Nap time," Sharon announced suddenly. "This will be a lot easier if we get her back to the car before she's dead weight."

"Nap time?" Brenda looked dubiously at the bouncing ball of energy. "Are you sure?"

"Oh, yeah." One-handed, Sharon began to gather their trash. "Trust grandma."

Unsurprisingly, Sharon's prediction came true, and Clarissa was sound asleep before Brenda had finished buckling her into her car seat, as if a switch had been flipped. The blonde shook her head as she moved around to the driver's side of her friend's car, which Sharon had suggested they take rather than having to move the car seat. "Boy, I wish I could fall asleep like that."

"Tell me about it," Sharon muttered, awkwardly fastening her seatbelt. Brenda wondered if Sharon had trouble falling asleep, if she was haunted by thoughts of Vivien. She wondered what Sharon dreamed when she did sleep. She envisioned Sharon alone in the dark in her quiet house.

Well, she reminded herself, Sharon wasn't alone now. And neither was Brenda.

Following Sharon's instructions, Brenda carried Clarissa down the hall past the kitchen to a room that was a picture-perfect child's nursery, and deposited her sleeping bundle in the waiting crib. As she stood up, arching her aching back, she took in her surroundings. Near the ceiling, bright hand-painted flowers ran around the room, turning the space into an exotic garden; and soft, puffy clouds danced overhead against a blue background like something out of a Renaissance painting. "Wow," Brenda breathed simply. "Who did that?"

"Oh, I did," Sharon replied as if it were nothing. "She'll sleep for an hour or so. Come on; we can have some grown-up time."

The afternoon brought coloring (loosely defined, since Clarissa was nowhere near mastering such concepts as staying inside the lines), multiple dramatic readings of _The Three Little Kittens_, a game of hide and seek that chiefly entailed Clarissa sitting on the floor of Sharon's closet amid her rows of shoes and giggling incessantly, _Sesame Street_, and another nap.

Brenda was feeding Clarissa her dinner of grilled chicken cubes, baby tomatoes, and cucumber slices when the doorbell chimed and Sharon excused herself. A moment later two sets of footsteps headed back toward the kitchen.

"Here they are," Sharon declared brightly. "Look, Clarissa, Uncle Daniel came to see you."

The child let out a crow of unrestrained delight, and Sharon met Brenda's dark eyes with a smirk. "I knew he wouldn't be able to stay away."

Brenda's heart pounded thunderously in her chest. She had successfully allayed her earlier anxiety about winning over one Raydor and now it returned full-force as she smiled politely at Sharon's son. The young man was clearly much more reserved than the toddler and observed her with a cautious, clinical eye.

"It's nice to see you again," Brenda said cheerfully, hoping her Southern charm would win him over.

"Likewise," he replied, turning his attention back to his mother. "What sort of son would I be if I didn't stop by to check on the invalid? Besides...I just _had_ to see this for myself."

"As you can see, we're all in one piece." Sharon patted his shoulder. "I thought you had lab today."

"Finished early," Daniel replied, sniffing around the hot dishes on the stovetop. "Do you mind if I...?" He pointed at the chicken, baring white teeth in a hungry smile.

"Please join us," Brenda invited brightly, hoping it wasn't _too _presumptuous to invite him to partake in a meal she hadn't cooked in a house that didn't belong to her. To her relief, Sharon was already pulling down an extra plate. Brenda focused on Clarissa, snorting when she squeezed out the middle of a baby tomato.

"How's my best girl?" Daniel asked, setting down his dinner beside the highchair. He ruffled her curly hair and kissed the top of her head. Clarissa smiled, her mouth full of food, and turned back to Brenda, holding out a piece of cucumber to share. "She must really like you," Daniel observed, watching the child and blonde interact.

"I sure hope so," Brenda said, accepting the cucumber and popping it into her mouth.

"She does," Sharon added, taking up her place at the table. "Cee adores Daniel; she typically forgets that other people exist when he's around."

"My place has been usurped," Daniel flatly conceded, though his face bore no jealousy or ill-will.

"I think she likes me 'cause I've got the food." Brenda nudged a chicken cube at the little girl, who promptly ate it.

There was a moment of silence before Sharon tactfully steered the conversation to her son's school work, giving Brenda a moment to collect herself. Her stomach tightened awkwardly as she considered whether or not to apologize for what had happened on his birthday. Though Sharon had assured her that she'd smoothed things over, Brenda couldn't help but feel like she'd spoiled his day. Tact and subtlety were not traits that the deputy chief excelled at, but she decided to leave the topic alone, not wanting to conjure up unpleasantness during dinner.

"So you're the close friend my mother raves about," Daniel finally said, turning his sharp Raydor eyes on her.

"Really, Shar?" Brenda batted her eyelashes at the captain. "You rave about me?"

"I wouldn't necessarily call it 'raving'," Sharon replied coolly.

Daniel grinned and exchanged a glance with his mother that was laden with meaning. "I would."

"You always have had a flair for the dramatic," his mother shot back, sipping her seltzer. "Leave some chicken for Brenda, Daniel; she hasn't eaten yet."

"I'm not a scavenger," he replied airily. "So, Chief Johnson -"

"Brenda," she interrupted hastily. "Please, call me Brenda."

"Brenda. My mother says you don't have much experience with children."

"Only when I was one," the blonde replied, perhaps a little too cheerfully. "But Clarissa's teachin' me, aren't you, sweetie pie?"

Brenda stroked the child's dark curls and Cee grinned. She then grabbed her child-sized dinner plate, whisked it into the air, and turned it upside down. "Finish!" she announced. The chief stared in consternation at the bits of chicken on the highchair tray and the single cherry tomato bouncing across the kitchen floor, and half expected her friend to scold her, but the older woman turned her displeasure on her granddaughter (in a manner that made her look like Mary Sunshine compared to how Brenda had heard her rip into perps and bumbling officers at work). Clarissa promptly began to cry, complete with wailing and giant crocodile tears streaming down her perfect round cheeks.

"Bath time?" Danny asked. He looked to Brenda and explained, "Not only does she_ love_ bath time, but once it's finished she usually conks out."

"Yeah, somebody's had a big day and is tired and cranky." Sharon nodded toward her right hand. "I'm not supposed to get this wet, so -"

"I'll do it." The young man obligingly got to his feet and immediately began to work the buckles on the toddler's chair, his hands much surer and more deft than Brenda's had been earlier. He scooped his niece into his arms and looked startled when she began to struggle, kicking out with her bare feet. "Ben-nah!" she fussed. "Ben-nah, Ben-nah!"

Daniel turned wide, wary green eyes on Sharon. "You want Brenda to give you your bath tonight?" he asked the wiggling child.

"You don't have -" began the captain.

"No, no." Brenda waved her friend's protestations off with a bright smile as she slid to her feet. "I'm happy to do it. You and Daniel can just visit."_ And he can't ask me twenty questions_, she added mentally, hoping her relief wasn't glaringly overt.

"I'll come get you started," Sharon insisted, leading the way to the bathroom. She showed Brenda the small chest in the closet containing Clarissa's bath toys and baby shampoo, and then tested the temperature of the bath water filling the tub. Clarissa was already squirming in Brenda's arms, eager to get in and splash.

Brenda bit her lip, looking a little anxiously at the other woman, ridiculously afraid that she might somehow break the child. "So do I just plop her in there and let her have at it?"

Sharon chuckled, the skin at the corners of her eyes crinkling appealingly with her mirth. "I'd advise you to undress her first, and at some point soap should be involved, but otherwise yes. Have at it. She'll stay in until she turns into a little prune if you let her." Sharon ducked, kissing Clarissa's palm and then each finger in turn until the girl giggled. "Won't you, Miss Priss? - Call if you need help."

"I won't," Brenda declared confidently, balancing Cee on the sink as she worked one chubby arm out of the toddler's yellow and orange striped turtleneck. "You go talk to Daniel." _And keep him out of here_, she thought. The last thing she needed was to have beloved Uncle Daniel scrutinizing her novice bath-giving technique.

Sharon was still smiling when she found Daniel in the living room, where he'd retired after wolfing down his chicken and salad.

"So," he began affably, sipping from another can of seltzer.

Sharon's eyebrows arched. "So," she echoed, flopping down beside him on the sofa and patting his knee with her uninjured hand.

He smirked, and Sharon was reminded why most people found the same expression so maddening on her own face. "So that's Brenda."

"Indeed. That is Brenda." Sharon rested her elbow on the back of the sofa, glad to relieve the strain on her screaming biceps.

"She's much more attractive when she's not throwing a tantrum."

"So is Clarissa," his mother responded equably. "So are you. You think your precious little niece's fits are bad? You weren't an unmitigated delight yourself."

"I wasn't sure she'd show."

"Yes, Daniel, I am aware of that." Sharon swiped her son's seltzer and took a long drink. "But I was. And who, as usual, was right?"

"Mmm...and don't you just love to remind me," he pointed out. "I have to give her credit though, I suppose, for coming through for you. After her bitch fit on our birthday, I wasn't so sure."

"I told you, Danny," she said, lowering her voice as though Brenda might hear them over the sound of the splashing bathwater, "she didn't know."

"That's no excuse for being a-"

She gave him _the look_ and he immediately halted his words, knowing better than to overstep his bounds by dissing her only friend. "At least you have someone. She's better than that other woman you used to hang around with. What was her name again? Darla?"

Sharon snorted and rolled her eyes heavenward, recalling the orange-haired wife of Paul's business partner. ""Darlene. Oh Lord, I remember her. I was so thankful when your father and I split up and I no longer had to feign interest in her friendship."

"So were we," Daniel mused, sinking back a little into the couch. "Remember those _awful_ oatmeal cookies she'd bring over for us?"

"How could I forget? You and your sister used to hide them between the sofa cushions." Sharon recalled many an evening where she'd pull out handfuls of cookie instead of the missing remote control. She had never been able to scold her children with a straight face, having been forced to eat the cardboard confection while Darlene watched and chattered on about garden beds and fertilizer. The memory conjured up the faintest hint of grainy cardboard on her tongue. She shuddered.

"I miss her," Danny said quietly, staring down at the floor.

Sharon knew that they were no longer talking about Darlene. She ruffled his hair, the stiff crinkle of gel scratching her palm, and sighed. "I know. So do I."

"Do you think-"

It was with great relief that Sharon heard the loud yelp coming from the bathroom. She'd heard all of his questions before, all requests to hear her voice the various possibilities surrounding Vivien's disappearance. Most nights she was willing to indulge him, but tonight she was exhausted and her hand was beginning to throb and she simply didn't have the heart to fortify him with false hypotheses. She feigned an exasperated sigh and heaved herself to her feet.

"Are you sure she knows what she's doing?" Daniel asked, setting down his seltzer and standing.

"She's resourceful." Sharon frowned, heading for the bathroom.

When the door glided open, the captain found herself unable to stifle a laugh. She'd been expecting Clarissa in tears, perhaps due to soap in her eyes or the unpleasant rub of the washcloth on her back, but not the delighted giggles coming from the tub. Beside her, on the sodden bath mat, knelt an equally sodden Brenda.

"You're supposed to be bathing _her_," Sharon pointed out with a laugh.

Chocolate eyes narrowed into a glare. "I _know_."

"I would've even let you take a shower. All you had to do was ask."

Under the pointed gaze Sharon dragged over her, Brenda's consternation had turned to embarrassment, and now to amusement. "I was conserving water," she replied primly, but was unable to smother her grin as she leaned over to drain the water out of the tub.

"Oh yes, that is usually why people bathe together," the captain bantered back, and suddenly Brenda was assaulted by an image of herself and her friend in the shower, this shower, together. Vividly she saw steam rising and a dark curl plastered to the elegant curve of an ivory neck, and before her mind's eye could sweep any lower, she shook herself and grabbed the ultra-soft towel that awaited Clarissa.

"Come on, Esther Williams," she teased, and although the toddler obviously didn't get the joke, she laughed at the sounds Brenda made as she gently, briskly rubbed her dry. Well, Brenda Leigh reasoned, recovering her equanimity, she'd seen Sharon half-naked yesterday, so it was only fair that Sharon should see her tonight looking like an escapee from a wet T-shirt contest.

Dry now, Clarissa stretched her entire body toward Sharon and demanded, "Mamamamama!"

For a second Brenda's heart stopped and she couldn't bring herself to meet Sharon's eyes. She thought of the photographs she'd seen of Vivien; she had her mother's long, dark hair and intelligent green eyes. It was only natural that Cee's ideas of the two women would have merged, but Brenda still avoided her friend's gaze.

Then she realized Sharon was calmly picking up Clarissa's onesie pajamas, which were cheerfully if strangely decorated with brightly colored flying saucers and purple aliens. "Ma ma ma shrrr," Clarissa repeated impatiently, and Sharon smiled at her. "Here I am," the dark-haired captain sing-songed, extending the new outfit to Brenda. "Brenda, if you can just get her dressed, you're off duty. I'll put her down."

"Sure thing." Brenda readjusted Cee on the edge of the counter and gamely grabbed one flailing leg. "Peachy keen, jellybean," she sang to the toddler in imitation of the way Sharon had spoken, and then glanced up at the other woman. "What's she callin' you, Sharon?"

Sharon chuckled and rolled her eyes as she leaned in the doorway. "That would be something resembling 'Mama Sharon.'"

Brenda Leigh's face lit up. "Aww, that's adorable!" she proclaimed. "I just couldn't see you as Grandma or Nana or Granny -"

Her friend interrupted with a disgusted "Ugh!" and an exaggerated shudder. "You don't think it's too cutesy? She didn't give me a choice, this one. Daniel calls me mom, so she picked up on that right away, and -" She shrugged. "Of course, it sounds like 'Masher.'"

Brenda snorted out a laugh. "Appropriate."

In response Sharon scrunched her nose and turned her attention to her granddaughter. "You ready for _Goodnight Moon_, baby? Let's go."

The younger woman was unabashedly curious about the bedtime ritual, but she was also shivering, her nipples jutting prominently and uncomfortably against the soaked fabric of her bra. A change of clothes was required, stat. With Clarissa's towel still draped around her shoulders, she darted out to the car to retrieve her overnight bag, and then ducked into Sharon's bedroom to change into the yoga pants, tank top, and hoodie she'd brought to sleep in. She promptly crashed into Daniel when she stepped out into the hallway.

"Whoa there." His light touch on her elbows steadied her, and then he stepped back politely. Brenda realized he was looking over her shoulder, and turned to see her bright orange duffel sitting on the foot of Sharon's bed. "Oh, I didn't realize you were spending the night."

Brenda smiled self-consciously, although she had no idea why. "Well, sure. If Clarissa needs something during the night, we can't have Sharon left in the lurch, can we?" From down the hall the low, soothing murmur of the older woman's voice reached Brenda's ears. "Is your mama still readin' to Clarissa?"

Daniel's lips quirked in a half-smile. "Yeah. If you go on, I'm sure you can make it for the third time through."

Brenda immediately set off down the hall, aware that Daniel was following. The blonde paused in the doorway, taking in the sight of Sharon sitting in the rocking chair with her granddaughter settled on her lap, and hesitated, uncharacteristically shy. Sharon looked up and smiled very softly in welcome. "Come in," she said, not altering the even pitch of her voice. "We don't mind an audience."

Behind Brenda, Daniel spoke equally quietly. "Mom, Brenda doesn't have to spend the night. I can."

Sharon's surprised gaze flickered toward her son before settling on Brenda's face. Whatever she saw there made her smile slightly. "No, sweetie," she said. "We're having a slumber party. It's girls' night."

Brenda dimpled happily and sank into the pale green armchair near the door. She smiled up at Daniel, who had leaned his body against the door frame. "I don't mind stayin'. Your girls will be in good hands," Brenda promised, returning her gaze to Sharon when she had flipped back to the beginning of the book.

Sharon began the story again, her low, melodious voice making even Brenda feel suddenly relaxed. She drew her legs onto the chair and hugged them to her chest, tipping her head to rest on her knee. She watched, awestruck, as Sharon cradled the child with her injured arm, propping open the book and flipping its pages with her free hand. Somehow, while her voice clearly and slowly enunciated the words, she managed to rock them gently.

Heavy-lidded eyelids drooped and Brenda bit her lip as she watched the child struggle with remaining awake before finally tipping her head against her grandmother's shoulder. Sharon finished out the story and, once she had closed the book, gracefully rose to her feet to settle Clarissa into her crib.

When Daniel moved into the nursery, standing alongside his mother, Brenda quietly unfolded herself from the chair and snuck out of the room, giving the family their moment alone. She wondered briefly about what her life might have been like if she had given in to Fritz's pressures to have a baby. How much of herself would she have given up to raise a child? Would a baby have saved their marriage? In Brenda's experience, that sort of arrangement only delayed the inevitable, and she felt a burst of relief that she had remained firm about what she wanted, thankful that there had not been a third party subjected to their separation.

No, Brenda decided, taking up residence on the end of the sofa. She had done the right thing-she hadn't been ready and certainly hadn't been willing to start a family with Fritz.

Still, there was something comforting and natural about being welcomed into the sanctuary of Sharon's home and her life and her family. Perhaps she had missed out on the road not taken with Fritz, but Brenda was certain that _this_ was the particular path that she was meant to be on.

Daniel and Sharon emerged from the nursery, drawing the door closed behind them. They were speaking in hushed tones as they came into the living room.

"You didn't have to leave," Daniel said, dropping onto the matching armchair. He kicked his feet up onto the coffee table, which Sharon promptly swatted down.

"I didn't want to intrude on your family time," Brenda remarked shyly.

"If Clarissa has anything to say about it, you most certainly _are_ family now," Sharon replied casually, raising her arms above her head. She stretched her body, standing on the tips of her toes and tipping her head back before finally releasing the pose with a groan. "My body's going to hate me for giving up on yoga until this thing is healed," she said, gesturing to her right hand. She sat down beside Brenda and dutifully elevated her arm.

"Is there any way I can help?" Brenda asked, trying not to imagine her body tangled with Sharon's in some impossible pretzel shape.

"I wish." She sighed.

"I'd keep an eye on her if I were you," Danny warned. "I wouldn't be surprised if you wake up tomorrow and find her in downward dog."

Brenda had no idea what that meant, but she deduced that whatever it was, it wouldn't be good on her hand.

Sharon scoffed. "I'm not _that_ bad."

The young man arched an eyebrow. "Yes, you are."

Brenda snorted. "Don't you go gettin' any ideas," she teased, nudging Sharon's hip with her foot. "I'll handcuff you to the bed if I need to."

Sharon's face colored faintly and Daniel whooped out a quiet laugh. "Ah, so it's _that_ kind of slumber party, is it?"

"Of course not!" Sharon exclaimed, her eyes wide and her color mounting. "Daniel!"

Brenda was mildly embarrassed too, as soon as she realized what she'd said, but found Sharon's embarrassment utterly disarming. It helped her forget her own and she grinned slyly. "That's right, Daniel, not with your mama's hand hurt like that," she drawled.

"You probably _are_ too lazy to do all the work," Sharon muttered, shooting Brenda a dark glare.

Had Sharon's son not been present, Brenda Leigh likely would have made a comment about Sharon's tongue still being in working order, but even she had limits. Her sly grin transformed itself into a beatific smile.

"Obviously you two need some time alone." Daniel smirked, his eyes dancing with mirth, as he stood and leaned over to buss his mother's cheek. "Far be it from me to interfere in a lovers' spat. Good night, ladies. Mom, call if you need anything."

Sharon scowled the entire time she told her son she loved him and to drive carefully, and Brenda tried her best not to giggle like a schoolgirl. Once Daniel was gone she sat up straighter and asked, "Where am I sleepin'? I left my bag in your room."

"With me, obviously. After you've handcuffed me to the bed and imprisoned me."

"Why, Shar, are you implyin' that's the only way I could get you into bed? I'm wounded."

"Call me 'Shar' again and I _will_ wound you," the dark-haired woman retorted. "The guest room is down the hall. I know you're bad with directions, but you can't possibly miss it: it's the one that doesn't have a crib."

Brenda settled back on the sofa and crossed her bare feet on the coffee table, just as Daniel had done. Sharon stared at them for several seconds, but made no move to swat them away, instead settling into the cushions at her end and giving Brenda a long look. "You're looking very pleased with yourself, deputy chief," she couldn't help commenting.

Brenda grinned as she tipped her head back, realizing just how tired her body was. Taking care of a toddler was serious business. "That's 'cause I managed to win over two members of the Raydor clan today for the price of one."

"Oh, you're that sure of Daniel, are you?"

In response Brenda smirked a smirk that was worthy of her companion. "I sure am," she declared brightly. "He's not upset with me any more at all, Sharon. Didn't you hear what he said before he left? Not only does he want you to date me, but he's gonna let me handcuff you to the bed!"

Sharon stared back, dismayed. After maybe ten seconds it occurred to her that, confronted by Brenda's sparkling eyes and triumphant smile, there was really only one way to proceed.

She laughed heartily.

And then she stood and cast the blonde the most seductive, come-hither look she could manage given that she still had to keep her right hand elevated, and crooked her left index finger in the other woman's direction. "Well then, come on, baby," she crooned, adding a little extra sashay to her step, which, to be fair, was never entirely free of sashay anyway. "I always keep a spare set of cuffs in my nightstand. Just get the chocolate syrup out of the refrigerator door, would you?"

For a few seconds Brenda looked every bit as dismayed, if not more, than her friend had a moment earlier. And then she took in Sharon's saucy little pose, the twinkle in her eyes - everything, right up to the half-cocked injured hand - and shook her head in wary admiration. "Captain Raydor," she drawled, drawing the syllables out to an ungodly length, "you play dirty. I _am_ impressed."

The older woman chuckled as she dropped her pose and flopped down on the sofa beside Brenda, causing both of them to bounce. "Oh, you have no idea. Are you impressed enough to make me a cup of tea? Rachel comes on in three minutes. Hurry up; I don't want to miss any."

Brenda was still smiling to herself as she made her way into the kitchen and filled the electric kettle. She took down two mugs from the cabinet and two bags of the green jasmine tea Sharon preferred, and then hunted through the refrigerator until she found, as the captain had promised, half a bottle of Ghirardelli chocolate syrup. She placed all the items on a tray she found stored with the cookie sheets, and then stood back to survey her handiwork with a big, satisfied grin. No doubt Sharon knew how to play dirty. But so did Brenda Leigh.


	11. Chapter 11

**Title: Since You Went Away - Chapter Eleven: Dance, Fools, Dance**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, iThe Closer/i**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 9007**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Raise a glass, put on your dancing shoes, and get ready for shenanigans. We hope this chapter will satisfy those of you who have been eager to see our favorite ladies' friendship develop into something a little less easily defined. Will write for comments!**

1.

Sharon already had one eyebrow raised when she opened her front door to admit Brenda Leigh. She gave the smaller woman an exaggerated once-over, taking in her very short, tight midnight-blue dress with its plunging neckline, her bare legs, and the killer silver high-heeled sandals on her feet. "Oh, I'm sorry - I thought you were still planning to go out with us tonight. I didn't realize you were going undercover with Vice instead."

Brenda glared at the captain, instinctively lifting her chin for effect, and shrugging one billowy sleeve off her shoulder. "And I didn't realize we were goin' to a church social instead of out dancin' at a club."

Sharon's eyes rolled toward the ceiling as she pivoted, her bare feet padding down the hall. Brenda closed the door behind them and followed. "This is not what I'm wearing. Obviously." As she spoke, she shrugged out of the gray pinstriped blazer and tossed it onto her bed.

"But I thought we were supposed to be leaving in a few minutes," Brenda pointed out, darting a look at Sharon's bedside alarm clock. She had been very carefully punctual, herself.

"Oh, honey." Sharon chuckled wryly as she began to unbutton her gray blouse, apparently at ease in Brenda's presence, but Brenda politely averted her eyes, and kept them averted even after the other woman had turned her back. "When he says 'about 8:45,' that means ten o'clock."

"Oh." Brenda's lips drew into a pout as Sharon studied the contents of her closet. "Nobody told me."

"I thought we could eat first, and have a drink."

"Why, Sharon - front-loading, at your age?"

"Exactly. At my age." Sharon looked over her shoulder, her hair swinging, and flashed Brenda a rueful grin. "I've got to have at _least_ one glass of wine to prepare myself mentally for this outing. The only reason I'm doing this is because I'm such a loyal, wonderful friend. What I can't figure out is why you're doing it."

"For moral support?" Brenda suggested with a small smile. "Because I'm also a loyal, wonderful friend?"

The reality was far more embarrassing, and Brenda was quite sure it was transparent to Sharon, but the captain refrained from comment, perhaps because she was too deeply immersed in the perusal of the approximately 47 black items of clothing visible to Brenda in her closet. Brenda was going along tonight because she hadn't been able to bear the thought of being left out.

She'd been jealous. Totally, preposterously, completely jealous.

When Sharon had declined an invitation to go to the movies on a lonely Saturday night because she already had plans, Brenda had been completely taken aback. Sharon actually had plans...without her? Co-dependent was not Brenda's style, but she'd grown accustomed to Sharon's company. She preferred it, if she were honest with herself, to spending time alone. And despite the fact that Sharon mentioned the only reason she couldn't go was because she promised to accompany Dr. Morales to some swanky club because his boyfriend had left him for a younger man, she couldn't stop herself from talking Sharon into allowing her to tag along.

If anything, Sharon had probably grown sick of Brenda's whining repetition of "I'm sure y'all will have a great time without me."

However, it helped the littlest bit to have heard the faintest bit of relief in Sharon's voice when she accepted the invitation she had browbeaten out of her.

As Sharon reached into her closet for what appeared to be a little black dress, Brenda cleared her throat. "Don't wear black," she suggested helpfully.

"Why?"

"Because you always wear black. Wear somethin' flashy."

"I don't own anything that's _flashy_."

"You shoulda told me...I coulda brought you somethin'."

Sharon snorted at the thought of the two of them sharing clothes, regardless of the fact that they clearly were not the same size. Close-but not quite. She hung the dress back up and scanned her clothes, curling her lip in distaste at the lack of appropriate club attire. She hovered a hand over another hanger, this one gray.

Brenda's voice sounded from directly behind her shoulder. "Not that one. That one's too..."

Sharon twirled around, quirking an eyebrow. "Do go on."

"Too conservative. C'mon, Sharon. Live a little! D'you have a little red dress in there? That'd be perfect."

The captain tossed her hair over her shoulder and took Brenda squarely by the shoulders, directing her toward the door. "Brenda Leigh, I am _not_ taking fashion advice from you. Now: out you go. You can help yourself to something to drink in the kitchen."

Brenda rolled her eyes. "_Fiiiiiine_. Be that way." She pointed an imperious finger at the darker haired woman. "But if you choose somethin' too borin', I'm gonna tell you just what I think!"

"Duly noted." With that, Sharon shut the door in Brenda's face.

With Brenda out of her hair, Sharon turned back to her closet and rifled quickly through the selection, finally pulling out several suitable items after rejecting everything else. She carefully got dressed, taking the time to prepare herself for her outing. She _hated_ the club scene and wished that the medical examiner were the type to drown his sorrows in chick flicks and ice cream instead. However, because she had a reputation as a good friend to protect (and also, perhaps, because she'd been neglecting him lately), she had reluctantly agreed to be his date.

That Brenda had badgered her way into earning an invite was simply a perk.

Sharon, despite her intense dislike for throbbing music and strobe lights, did nothing halfway. Clad in a fresher, sexier pair of lacy red undergarments (there was no reason why she couldn't feel sexy and be supportive at the same time, she reasoned), she touched up her makeup, adding a little more eyeliner and a darker lipstick to enhance her features. Smacking her lips, Sharon nodded at her reflection and then began the meticulous act of getting dressed.

When she reached for the door handle several minutes later, it was with a smirk of gargantuan proportions plastered on her face. She would show Brenda just how boring she wasn't.

Sharon found Brenda in the kitchen, digging through the fridge. She waited while the blonde loaded her palm full of seedless grapes and took particular delight in the look of utter shock on the younger woman's face when she shut the door and saw her.

"Um..." Brenda's eyes danced over her body, quickly taking everything in, before she finally settled on Sharon's feet, which were clad in knee-high black stiletto boots. She gaped a little at the sight of the dangerously pointy heels. She then completely gawked at the dark blue jeans that hugged Sharon's hips like a second skin. When she saw Sharon's rather low-cut black blouse, which somehow managed to drape and cling in all the right places, she realized she'd squeezed the grapes in her hand.

"I hope you're not too disappointed. Embarrassed to be seen with me." Sharon reached around the blonde, plucking one of the unmolested grapes from her fingers. "All black, no sequins, nary a smear of glitter. Just typical. Boring. Sharon." She popped the grape into her mouth and Brenda focused on the daringly dark shade staining her lips, so different from what Captain Raydor wore.

"I never said you were boring," Brenda countered rather vaguely, still staring. "Can you dance in those shoes?"

"If necessary, not that I plan to do much dancing." Sharon moved around the kitchen, retrieving a bottle of wine and two glasses. "What do you want for dinner?"

The deputy chief ignored the question, concentrating on Sharon's boots. She was undeniably impressed. "Why not? We are goin' dancing, right? Or was that a euphemism as well, like 8:45 for 10:00?"

"Oh, there will be as much dancing as your little heart desires, Brenda Leigh. I promise you that." Sharon looked up from pouring two large glasses of pinot noir, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "They will _love_ you there."

Mollified, Brenda sat down at the table and placed her wine squarely between her elbows. "So, Morales's boyfriend just up and left him for someone else, somebody a lot younger?"

Sharon bit her lip, looking askance. "Maybe I shouldn't have told you that," she fretted. "But if I know him at all - which I do - you'll get the entire sordid tale straight from the horse's mouth tonight, more than once."

Brenda raised her eyebrows. "I hardly think you violated his trust, Sharon. Did you see the way he was carryin' on at work this week? He looked more depressed than the corpses." Sharon snorted, not without sympathy, and Brenda continued, "So what, Morales is out to cougar it up tonight?"

The older woman choked on her wine, spluttering. "I'm fairly certain that term only pertains to women."

The blonde grinned. "So if you were datin' me, for example -"

"You're obsessed," Sharon accused, and then scoffed, disgusted. "Hardly. I believe the point is a _significant_ age difference."

Brenda was all innocence. "You don't call eight years significant?"

In response Sharon only flipped her hair over her shoulder and drank deeply of her pinot, realization finally dawning that she was in for a very long, very interesting evening.

2.

"Chief, are you all right?" Dr. Morales asked over the roar of music, leaning in a little closer. "You look a little pale."

Brenda smiled politely, training her features to display a look of nonchalant interest. She noted that the man's breath was already sour with alcohol, and she wondered just how many drinks he'd had before they arrived. "Oh I'm fine," she replied casually, willfully ignoring the two men beside her who were engaged in a furious lip lock.

The doctor exchanged an amused glance with the captain and wrapped his lips around the straw of his beverage. He slurped the remaining quarter-inch of his vibrant blue drink with relish and frowned when he had drained the glass. "I'm dry. You two want anything? Ooh-I'll get us a fishbowl!"

The older woman scrunched her nose in distaste. "Absolutely not," Sharon warned.

"A _what_?" Brenda asked.

"Do you really want to experience Brenda Leigh in all of her drunken glory after half a fishbowl?" Sharon asked wryly.

"I sort of do, actually." A glimmer flashed in Morales's eyes. "Can you imagine the leverage we'd have?"

"Aside from the fact that I don't know what y'all are talkin' about, I thought we agreed that what happens in _Throb_ stays in _Throb_?" Brenda tilted her head in the direction of a man in a neon cowboy hat, her mouth a smirk as it pronounced the club's slightly vulgar name. She'd thought Sharon had been joking when she'd revealed the dance club's unforgettable moniker - clearly indicating that Brenda still had not mastered all the shades of the older woman's sense of humor.

"Oh _fine," _the medical examiner replied with a disappointed huff. "What do you both want? I'll get this round."

After Sharon asked for a Manhattan, Brenda twisted her mouth in indecision. "Oh...um, somethin' fruity, I guess." Realizing what she'd said, she flushed. "Uh-"

Morales snorted. "I'll be back. Feel free to get into trouble while I'm gone." He winked and then headed through the throng of people toward the packed bar.

When he was gone, Brenda turned a pointed glare at Sharon. "You didn't tell me this was a _gay_ club!"

Sharon smirked and, were it not for the decidedly awkward stance the older woman had taken against the wall, Brenda would have almost believed that she was completely comfortable in her surroundings. "Look at who we're with; where else would we have gone?" She narrowed her eyes a little, the green sparkling in the flicker of a nearby disco ball. "Are you nervous, Brenda Leigh? Afraid you'll catch the gay?"

The blonde rolled her eyes and swatted at Sharon with her clutch. "No! Of course not. I am perfectly fine with gay people. I just..." She shrugged, casting her eyes over the crowd. "I wasn't prepared."

"How do you prepare for a gay club if _this_ is how you prepare for a straight club?" Sharon drawled, her gaze drifting to the dip of the other woman's cleavage. She noted once again the smooth, curve-hugging lines of the dress and the daring hemlines. Her eyes widened. "Brenda!"

"What?"

"Did you tag along so you could find someone to hook up with?" Even in the scant lighting, Sharon could tell that the other woman was blushing.

"No! C'mon-would I really ditch you for some stranger just to get lucky?"

Sharon pursed her lips. "You might."

"I resent that!"

"Oh, so you dressed like that for me, then?" Sharon couldn't resist taunting. "Or was it for Morales?"

"I just thought it'd be nice to get dressed up and go out for once," the younger woman returned defensively. "What's so wrong with that? Besides, look at you." She gestured adamantly to make her point, pointing unintentionally at the hint of the dark red bra she could just glimpse deep in the shadow of Sharon's cleavage. "That's hardly how you dress every day."

"You were the one who accused me of being boring."

"I did not say - Oh, for heaven's sake!"

Brenda's eyes fell upon something marvelous - a vacant table - and she gave up arguing with the stubborn captain, seizing her hand instead and taking off at a trot. "Thank goodness," she sighed as she sank into a chair. "Now, as I was sayin', you can play it cool all you want, but you're not foolin' me. You're not as cosmopolitan and sophisticated as you want people to think. You're as uncomfortable as I am. You were doin' a real good job of proppin' up that wall back there."

Sharon smirked derisively. "True, but that's not because we're in a gay club; it's because we're in any club."

Instinctively the blonde glanced around. If nothing else, this was an excellent arena for honing her people-watching skills. "Oh, you shouldn't be uncomfortable," she reassured. "You're definitely not the oldest person here, not by a long shot."

Sharon's eyebrows drew together as she scowled pointedly. "That is _not_ what I meant, thank you. This just isn't exactly my scene." She looked around too, wishing Morales would hurry up with the drinks. He'd probably gotten side-tracked by some musclebound young thing at the bar.

"Well, I guess it's not exactly my scene either," the blonde admitted with a rueful grin. "I didn't expect quite so many tanned, attractive men in mesh tank tops and glitter."

The dark-haired woman snickered. "When was the last time you went out to a club, Brenda Leigh? I mean, what decade?"

"Oh, hah-hah. Very funny." Brenda nudged her friend. "Hey, why do I get the impression that that man over there isn't a real policeman?"

Sharon's eyes twinkled. "Wanna arrest him for impersonating an officer?"

Brenda sighed. "No, I want to dance," she replied, pouting slightly as she gazed around the room.

"Morales will dance with you - if he ever comes back." Sharon was getting thirsty.

"Yeah, I suppose I could dance with him," the chief conceded discontentedly.

Again her friend snickered. "Not your type? Sorry, honey. Somehow I suspect most of the men here share the same opinion about you. Looks like you're stuck with me."

The blonde propped her elbow on the table and pursed her lips. "How do you know you're _my_ type?" she teased.

Green eyes rolled heavenward. "I meant stuck at the table with me, Brenda Leigh. But as far as that goes, what makes you think you're _my_ type?"

Brenda tossed her hair, golden curls dancing. "If I'm not your type, then who here is?" she challenged.

"Morales."

"Gee, Sharon, I hate to break this to you, but if he's your type, there may be a good reason why your previous relationships haven't worked out."

The captain snorted, and somehow managed to look elegant doing it. "I meant here's Morales with our drinks." Her eyes narrowed ominously. "Sort of. He's got a god-damn fishbowl."

When Brenda looked over her shoulder, she was equally amused and alarmed to see that Morales was, in fact, carrying a small fishbowl (the same size that she'd kept her beta fish, Delilah, in when she was in college), filled to the brim with a blue concoction and three straws. Her eyes widened. "What on earth _is_ it?" she demanded.

"It's everything," Sharon said. When the pathologist paused to say something to a passing dancer, she placed a hand on Brenda's arm. "For your own sake, Brenda Leigh, pace yourself."

"Awe, what a courteous date you are, lookin' out for my well-bein'." Brenda batted her eyes flirtatiously, covering Sharon's hand with her own. "I promise not to be an obnoxious drunk."

"I'm holding you to that."

"Getting friendly, are we?" Morales said, depositing the cocktail on the table. "If I have to be the third wheel tonight, you might as well just do me a favor and put me out to pasture."

Brenda extracted her hand and rubbed his forearm. "There now...there's plenty of love to go 'round."

"I certainly hope so," he said, taking a long pull from the straw angled in his direction. "Papi's ready for some lovin' tonight."

Sharon leered. "I take it you won't be leaving with us."

"I damn well hope not!" The man exaggerated a shudder and Brenda laughed. "I'm ready to drown my sorrows and get lost in a sea of men. Now-drink up, ladies. We're going to have some _fun_ tonight."

Brenda suspiciously eyed the drink. They were supposed to share? She waited until Sharon took a sip before taking one of her own. She smacked her lips. "Mmm! This is tasty! It's like juice!"

"Adult juice!" Morales cheerfully added, and Sharon glared. "So, if we get bored of the techno scene, we can check out the blue room downstairs."

"Blue room?" Brenda questioned, taking another sip. When the alcohol warmed her belly, she was reminded that it was not, in fact, juice and decided to heed Sharon's warning to take it easy.

"Different DJ, different tone. Down there you'll hear more of the old homo standards, like Cher, Britney, Gaga, Cyndi..."

Brenda clapped her hands together. "That sounds like fun! Can we go down there later?"

Morales pressed his hands to his chest and looked imploringly at Sharon. "Who knew our little country bumpkin would blossom amongst her queer brethren?"

"Ms. Johnson is always full of surprises," Sharon commented, the corner of her lip perking up.

"Only to keep you on your toes," Brenda shot back.

A tall shirtless man leaned over Morales's shoulder and spoke directly into his ear. When he stood up, the doctor waggled his eyebrows and followed him into the crowd of dancing men and women.

"Well...didn't take him long, did it?" Brenda commented, craning her neck to try to spot the short man amidst the dancers.

"He's resilient."

"People sure are friendly here," the blonde added, sitting back in her chair as she scanned the room again.

_More than you realize_, Sharon thought as she spotted a woman sizing up the deputy chief from across the room as if she were dessert. Her heart thudded unpleasantly when she caught the woman's eye; to her own surprise, Sharon narrowed her eyes possessively and smirked. The woman frowned and turned away.

"See, aren't you glad I'm here?" Brenda asked suddenly, startling Sharon. The brunette looked askance, but the blonde showed no sign of having witnessed that little exchange. Sharon leaned in and took an experimental drink of the blue concoction. It really was delicious - lethally delicious.

"If I weren't here, you'd just be sittin' here all by your lonesome," Brenda continued, and Sharon cocked her head to meet her friend's direct gaze. Brenda's forehead wrinkled in thought. "Or would you? Sharon, what would you be gettin' up to if I weren't here?"

Brenda had, of course, already described exactly the evening the captain had anticipated. Minus her lithe blonde companion, she'd be sitting here, or more likely leaning against a shadowy segment of the wall, as unobtrusively as possible, nursing her Manhattan (because Morales wouldn't have dared get her a fishbowl). But as she fortified herself with a longer drink of whatever this blue poison might actually be, it occurred to her that she could have a little fun with Brenda. So as the straw slipped from between her lips, Sharon propped her chin on one fist and responded with a slight, mysterious smile and a quirk of her brow.

"Would you be dancing?" Brenda asked, unabashedly curious. She'd taken the bait.

Sharon shrugged.

"Who would you dance with? Since Morales is otherwise occupied." Dark lashes fluttered as Brenda twisted her upper body around, surveying what she could see of the cavernous club. "It would be a woman, right? So which woman?" The blonde tilted her head toward the bar. "How 'bout her?"

Unerringly, Brenda had chosen the slim Asian woman who'd been eying the deputy chief a moment earlier. Sharon smirked. "I don't think I'm her type."

"How can you tell? Okay, not her." Eyes still roaming their surroundings, Brenda leaned in to take another drink and nearly bumped noses with Sharon, who was doing the same thing. Startled, the blonde jerked back, her straw slipping from the fishbowl and spattering Sharon's blouse with a shower of blue droplets. Green eyes narrowed in a glare.

"Oops, sorry." Brenda giggled nervously. "At least you're wearin' black. It doesn't show. - What about that woman there, in the fedora? She's cute..."

Sharon found herself surprisingly willing to play along (what else did she have to do?), so she looked in the direction Brenda had indicated. "She is cute," she agreed, surveying the dapper woman in her crisp Brooks Brothers ensemble. "Too butch for me, though."

"So butch doesn't do it for you?"

The captain shrugged philosophically. "If I were going to be with a woman, I'd want someone more... conventionally feminine, I suppose."

"More feminine: check." The younger woman was quiet for a moment, and then exclaimed, "Ooh, her!"

"The redhead?" The woman in question was lovely, her long auburn layers dancing around her heart-shaped face as she leaned in to talk to her male companion. She wore a little red dress, not dissimilar to what Sharon imagined Brenda had been hoping the captain had hidden away in her own closet, and she was a few inches shorter than Sharon. As the captain's gaze swept back up to the woman's face, she was startled to realize the redhead was staring right back, her eyes warm and amused. Sharon blinked and felt herself flush slightly. The woman tilted her head and smiled flirtatiously.

Sharon's gaze snapped back to Brenda. "I think she's straight."

Brenda laughed, her eyes wide with amazement. "Somehow I don't think so." But since she definitely didn't want to lose her only companion in this sea of sweaty men to the arms of some little waif with garishly dyed red hair, she cheerfully moved on, suggesting, "I know - her!"

It was Sharon's turn to laugh. "Brenda, that's a man."

Brown eyes widened with curiosity. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

The blonde blinked slowly. "Wow. I'm impressed. He has better legs than I do."

Again they both leaned in to drink, but this time they were paying attention, and no near collision occurred. Instead brown eyes gazed into green from startling proximity.

Brenda's voice was softer when she spoke again. "I guess we're stuck with each other after all."

Sharon smirked and leaned back, relieved to put a little distance between them. Sharing a drink was unexpectedly intimate. It took her back to high-school days of varsity letterman jackets and shared milkshakes, in neither of which had she partaken. "Oh, so you'd choose me over a gay man? I'm so flattered."

"And other women!" Brenda insisted earnestly, and then sighed. "Poor Morales. He and Kyle had been together for a long time, right? And to have him leave for somebody younger that he met at the _gym_ -" The blonde's lip curled in distaste. "It must be so demoralizin'."

Sharon heaved an uncharacteristically moody sigh. "Oh, it is."

Brenda's eyebrows arched. "How would you know?"

"Paul left me for a younger woman," the brunette replied solemnly, looking down into the depths of their drink. Brenda looked too, half expecting to see a reincarnated Delilah swimming around.

"What?" the blonde gasped, appalled. "Is he crazy? Why on earth would anyone want a younger woman when he could have _you_? He must've lost his mind, Sharon!"

The other woman blinked. "I - Thank you, Brenda. That's very sweet."

"Oh, it's my southern charm." The blonde smiled. "But I mean it. You're smart and funny and sexy..." (Sexy? Where had that come from?)

Sharon looked into the very sincere dark eyes of the woman who'd called her a bitch, the Wicked Witch of FID, and was suddenly ashamed of herself. Brenda immediately read her unusual hang-dog expression and her eyes narrowed.

"You made that up," she accused, and Sharon nodded. She had no idea why she'd done it - to defuse the sudden tension she'd felt between them, maybe?

"Never lie to a CIA-trained interrogator, Captain Raydor," Brenda continued, her voice steely. "Now you owe me. Big time."

"Fair enough," Sharon replied, twirling her straw in her fingers. Knowing the deputy chief's unruly naughty streak, she could only imagine what would be her penance.

"There's no way you're gettin' out of dancin' with me now."

Sharon barely stifled a grimace. She wasn't nearly drunk enough (or at all, really) for dancing. Though she wasn't necessarily the type to rely on alcohol for liquid courage, she felt entirely too aware of Brenda and her tight dress and her bare legs (which were really much, much nicer than the drag queen's) to comfortably allow herself to lower her inhibitions. She took another sip. "Drink up then if you want to dance. This won't be here when we get back."

And so they did, heads close together as they casually sipped from their garish fishbowl, pausing every so often to talk. Sharon effectively distracted Brenda with stories of a much younger Morales, regaling her with tales of the man's affinity for tasteless jokes and his ongoing crush on David Gabriel.

When they'd polished off a little more than a third of the drink, Brenda finally pushed her straw away. "I don't wanna sit here and get drunk and watch everyone else havin' all the fun. C'mon...it's time to show me what you've got." She clutched Sharon's hand and pulled her to her feet, dragging her toward the packed dance floor.

When they reached the outer edge of sweating, undulating bodies, they looked at each other expectantly, each waiting for the other to make the first move. Brenda shimmied uncomfortably and, at the sight of Sharon's smirk, stomped her foot. "I don't wanna be on the outside," she said, her lips close to Sharon's ear as she competed with the loud throb of techno music. "I don't like all these people watchin' me."

"No one's watching."

Brenda looked past Sharon's shoulder, noticing the red-haired woman's eager eyes pointed in Sharon's direction. Brenda glared and once more took up Sharon's hand. "Yes, they are." She cast a haughty glance at the woman and tugged her into the crowd, pushing her way until they were hidden amongst the masses. Several glittered, shirtless men smiled at them, pressing their bodies closer to their partners to create a tiny pocket for the two women, which left them with barely enough room to dance without brushing against each other.

The blonde gave the older woman a challenging glare and, with a fortifying breath, Sharon began to sway her hips to match the tempo of the music's beat.

Brenda grinned when Sharon started to dance first (of _course_ she would go first) and began to move her body in a similar rhythm. She wasn't the greatest dancer but she could hold her own, and the low lighting and extravagant moves of those around her made her feel instantly at ease. Meeting Sharon's eye, she twisted and moved her feet with gusto, trying not to focus too much on the fact that their thighs were bumping together.

All things considered, there were worse things than dancing with Brenda Leigh Johnson. Sharon's body thrummed with the infectious pulse of the music and energy that surrounded them. If she hadn't been so comfortable with Brenda, Sharon doubted she would have left the safety of her table. However, the glint in her eye pulled directly at her curiosity, leaving the woman eager to discover just how wild and reckless the blonde was willing to get. Swallowing her awkwardness, Sharon focused instead on the way the flashing lights shimmered across Brenda's hair and highlighted the long, sinewy slope of her neck. Moving like this, carefree and exhilarated in a faceless crowd, made Brenda look years younger and Sharon was awed to see her lose herself in it all, closing her eyes and surrendering herself completely. The sight was breathtaking.

An over-enthusiastic dancer behind Sharon jarred her back, shoving her forward. She collided with Brenda, their hips pressed flush together as Sharon placed a steadying hand on Brenda's waist. They paused like this for a breathless moment, each woman watching the other's face for signs of discomfort. When none came, Brenda's mouth slowly twisted into a grin before she started dancing again, her hips guiding Sharon's into a steady rhythm.

Sharon felt herself grin back. She gripped Brenda a little more tightly, bringing their bodies more comfortably together so they wouldn't bump awkwardly into one another, so each woman's hands and thighs and knees had somewhere to go. A moment ago she'd been almost jealous of Brenda's lack of inhibition, her obvious ability to melt into the simple joy of the dance - something that had everything to do with simultaneously fully inhabiting every fiber of your body and completely forgetting it existed. That was why Sharon did yoga; but still, it had been a very long time since Sharon had been able to melt fully into the simple joy of anything. Her life was too complicated. There was too much uncertainty, too much pain, too much inadequacy. For a few minutes there she'd felt like the moth dancing around the younger woman's flame.

But that jolt, and that grin - Sharon had realized didn't have to dance around on the edge. She could jump right in too, with Brenda there beside her. It wasn't so hard after all. She laughed, just because she could, and the other woman laughed too, as if she understood.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder, and Sharon automatically turned to see the Asian woman who'd been giving Brenda Leigh a come-hither stare earlier. Unsurprisingly, she paid no attention to the captain, but grinned at the blonde.

"Dance?" she asked winningly.

Brenda's dark eyes widened. And then, after only a second, her eyebrows drew together in a severe frown. "That's what I was doin', until you interrupted." She moved closer, hooking one arm around Sharon's neck. "Excuse us."

Obligingly, the captain spun them away, enjoying the dark flush that spread over Brenda's cheeks and crept down her neck, and also, if she was honest, enjoying the envious expression on the third woman's face. "Are you not interested because she's a woman?" Sharon wondered, genuinely curious.

Brenda Leigh rolled her eyes. "I'm not interested because I'm dancin' with _you_, unless this is your not-so-subtle way of tryin' to ditch me for Miss Red Dress over there."

Sharon chuckled. "It's been about twenty-five years since anyone accused me of subtlety."

The smaller woman grinned and fluttered her eyelashes. "So no?"

"No," Sharon confirmed. It took her a moment to realize that the music had changed, one song merging into the next. Not that she could tell much difference - they all seemed to have the same driving, repetitive bass line - but this one was louder, and a black light had flashed on. Mr. Neon Cowboy Hat, now sporting a neck ruff of multi-colored glow sticks, bounced up and down over Brenda's shoulder like a human pogo stick.

"Let's try downstairs," Sharon suggested.

Brenda frowned. "What?" she shouted, her white teeth flashing.

Sharon stopped moving, leaning in to speak directly into her friend's ear. "Let's go downstairs!" Her breath caused wispy curls to dance, and she smelled sweat, light perfume, and the chemically-rich sweetness of the drink they'd been sharing.

The blonde nodded eagerly, looking a little relieved, and clung to Sharon's hand as the taller woman led them off the dance floor, wending through the ever-swelling crowd and an entirely unacceptable number of glow sticks, given that most of the patrons were well over thirty.

It wasn't easy navigating through the mass of people, though Sharon noted with satisfaction that many of the newcomers seemed to be coming from the stairwell, some of them passing out glow sticks and slathering others in neon body paint. It hardly surprised her that _this_ was the scene into which Morales would choose to insert himself with little thought to her own comfort, reminding her once more just how relieved she was that Brenda had accompanied her. She squeezed the other woman's hand as they headed downstairs.

They passed the crowded bathrooms and came into a spacious inlet in the hallway, the half-room dimly lit but considerably cooler than the upper level. There weren't many people; those who had sought refuge here were gulping down drinks and conversing without the blaring speakers to compete with.

"Guess the party's upstairs," Brenda pointed out, tugging Sharon in the direction of the small bar that was set back against the wall.

"You don't mind, do you?"

"Not at all! All those flashin' lights and glowy things were givin' me a headache." She inserted herself between two people at the counter and leaned in to the bartender, requesting something that Sharon couldn't hear. When she turned around after slapping several bills on the bar top, she held out a shot glass filled with a lime green beverage.

"What is this?" Sharon asked.

"I have no idea. I told her to make us somethin' yummy." The blonde extended her glass. "To us."

Sharon grinned, the back of her neck growing warm once more. "To us." They clinked glasses and knocked back their shots, the sour apple taste leaving them both with a slight pucker on their mouths.

"Whew...that was strong!" Brenda exclaimed, smacking her lips. "Wanna check out this blue room?"

Sharon nodded, allowing Brenda to take her hand and lead down the winding corridor. As they drew nearer to the room, they could hear the beginning of Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl."

"How fun!" Brenda said excitedly, pulling her friend into the entrance of the blue room. Unsurprisingly, the walls were painted a vibrant sky blue, giving the room an entirely different vibe than the main dance floor upstairs. The room was busy though not overwhelmingly so and the lighting was better, giving them a chance to see each other without having to squint.

Brenda guided them onto the dance floor, immediately throwing herself into moving to the music. She bubbled with laughter and spun around, her dark eyes gleaming as she took Sharon's hand and twirled her around. The older woman laughed mirthfully.

Sharon felt much more relaxed in this room, appreciating that the more laid-back, fun atmosphere had alleviated a little of the tension she had felt upstairs when her body had been pressed against Brenda's. The pull of her curves and the heat of her body had been more intoxicating than the alcohol they'd consumed and Sharon vaguely wondered what it would be like to be totally, completely drunk on Brenda Leigh Johnson-if she wasn't already.

In this blue room, dancing to Billy Joel with her best friend, Sharon felt twenty-five again...only at twenty-five, Sharon didn't muse over what her friend looked like beneath the suggestive cling of her dress. But then, she reasoned, when she was twenty-five, having someone hold her close the way Brenda Leigh had been doing upstairs wasn't the rare occurrence it had become today. Smirking to herself, Sharon spun the blonde beneath their joined hands, and Brenda grinned happily. _Oh, if only you knew,_ Sharon thought, and couldn't swallow the laughter that bubbled up from her chest.

"What's so funny?" Brenda asked, using their joined hands to tug the other woman close again, into the cradle of her hips, so she could hear the anticipated response.

Again the captain laughed. "I - No, I just realized I'm actually having fun."

Brenda's eyebrows rose. "You just realized? Sharon, you always have fun when I'm around," she teased.

Sharon smirked. Oh, yes, she could think of many times over the past three years when she'd looked back on moments spent in Chief Johnson's company with giddy rapture at the_ fun_ they'd had together.

Brenda scrunched her nose as if reading Sharon's mind, which was good, because the brunette didn't relish the idea of shouting out her sarcasm over the insistent voice of Lady Gaga, who was singing about how you were born this way, baby. "We need another drink," the chief declared.

Sharon obligingly followed her friend back to the bar, their hands linked like those of school children on the buddy system. Before Brenda caught the attention of the bartender, though, Sharon stopped her with a hand on her arm. "Just a soda or something." Sharon did not need more alcohol. A sweaty, smiling, gyrating Brenda was enough for her to contend with; with the dangerous aid of more booze, she feared she might forget she wasn't a carefree twenty-five-year-old out with her pretty girlfriend, and do something _really_ stupid. An inappropriate kiss or grope was pretty much par for the course at that age, wasn't it? But it would be a lot harder to ignore at fifty-four.

Sharon accepted the Coke Brenda handed to her and guzzled thirstily through the little green straw. Maybe she was drunk after all. Maybe Brenda was drunk, and Sharon had absorbed the alcohol through her skin. Maybe she needed a distraction.

"Let's dance," she said imperatively, snagging Brenda's elbow and leading her back the way they'd come. Brenda bobbed along with her, chewing enthusiastically on her straw. Cher asked if they believed in life after love, and Sharon slung an arm around Brenda's waist, drawing her into an extravagant sweep. The younger woman threw back her head and laughed like one of the twenty-five-year-olds they weren't.

They danced until they were both panting and sweating; Sharon's feet ached, and she was sure Brenda's did too. But still they whirled around and around, unwilling, maybe unable, to stop, laughing for no reason, smiling and hanging onto one another for support.

The older woman's left instep emitted a painful twinge of protest at the unnatural angle into which it had been forced for hours and she opened her mouth to suggest they go see what the hell Morales was getting up to, when Brenda's face lit from within with incandescent joy. The blonde drew back from Sharon to clap gleefully. "I _love_ this song!"

Everyone else did too, it seemed. Sharon stood back, bemused, as Brenda Leigh began to sing along, her off-key warbling drowned out by the pulsing music and the enthusiastic singing of the crowd: "Life is a mystery, everyone must stand alone..."

Sharon stepped back, content to watch as Brenda bobbed and bounced and spun, caught up in the moment and the movement of the entire crowd. The blonde had closed her eyes, and somehow that made Sharon feel like a voyeur, as if she were witnessing some private rite or ritual; but she didn't look away. Green eyes devoured the spectacle of tangled blonde curls, the dewy flush of smooth skin, and the flexing of powerful muscles in those long, colt-like legs.

Suddenly Brenda's eyes popped open, whether because she had felt the absence of her friend at her side or the laser-like focus of that stare, or both. Dark chocolate met that peculiar green and the blonde blushed furiously. Sharon felt her own cheeks heat with embarrassment and something both darker and brighter. Brenda's lips curved into a shy, soft smile. "You're not dancin'."

"I was watching you," Sharon replied, although the words were lost in the music. Maybe Brenda knew how to read lips. The smaller woman shuffled in toward Sharon, making more room for the enthusiastic dancers at her back. Her smile widened and laughter bubbled up to her lips, although she couldn't have explained why. Sharon grabbed her wrist and began backing her way toward the edge of the dance floor to keep them from being crushed by the frenzied, Madonna-mad mob. She didn't stop until her shoulder blades touched the wall, and then she leaned gratefully into its support.

"We can sit," Brenda volunteered quickly. "Do your feet hurt?"

They did, but suddenly the captain didn't want to sit. "I'm fine."

Accepting that response, Brenda leaned against the wall beside the taller woman, misjudging the distance and ending up pressed against her from shoulder to knee. The solid warmth of Sharon's curvy body was surprising but not, the blonde decided, unpleasant, so she relaxed and sucked greedily at the melting ice in her little plastic cup.

Someone jostled Sharon's shoulder from the opposite side and she tipped dramatically into Brenda, thrown off balance by her very high heels and precarious pose, and the chief's cup bounced to the floor as she braced herself and gripped Sharon's upper arms to keep both of them from toppling onto the sticky floor.

Sharon whipped around, unintentionally giving Brenda a mouthful of her lilac-scented hair, her mouth already open to express her displeasure to the rude people who'd bumped her, when she froze. To her eternal embarrassment, she felt her eyes widen. Clearly, scolding would avail nothing; the women beside them were otherwise occupied.

At least, she mused, the persistent young Asian woman was too busy to hit on Brenda Leigh again.

With similar satisfaction Brenda noted that the redhead had evidently given up on luring Sharon away.

The captain felt her skin heat with embarrassment, which was silly. The pair next to them didn't seem to care if they had an audience, so there was no reason to be embarrassed at being in the position of hapless spectator. Still, good manners dictated that she look away.

The captain ignored good manners, swallowing hard as the petite redhead drew the other woman's lower lip into her mouth, dragging her perfect white teeth across it. Her parents must have paid a fortune for dental work. The tension in Brenda's body, the tightening of her grip on Sharon's shoulders, told the brunette that she, too, was caught up in the spectacle. Sharon wondered if Brenda realized that thing with her teeth was an exact imitation of what the deputy chief did constantly to her own lower lip. Green eyes still focused on the other couple, Sharon had a vivid image of herself doing just that to the younger woman, nipping sharply and then soothing the hurt with her tongue. The answering throb of arousal she felt between her legs was so swift and sure that she gasped.

The two women next to them were fused together in an open-mouthed kiss, but Sharon was much more aware of Brenda Leigh's fast breathing, the rapid, moist exhalations tickling the sensitive skin just below the captain's ear. The kiss went on and on, and Sharon knew that she, too, was breathing harshly, her heart thundering along as if she'd just completed a sprint. The redhead unashamedly palmed her taller companion's ass and Sharon's hips shifted restlessly, instinctively pressing more firmly into the cradle of warmth at her back. Her skin prickled with hot mortification, but Brenda Leigh's hand fluttered at Sharon's waist before settling there, grasping her tightly and fitting their bodies together. Sharon was light-headed. Brenda's smaller body felt like an extension of her own: she could feel the other woman's quick pulse, the thudding of her heart, the tension in her muscles - She could feel how aroused she was. How aroused they both were.

Brenda Leigh exhaled shakily. Her lips were the barest centimeters from the side of Sharon's neck.

Delicate fingers cupped one small breast through the flowing fabric of the redhead's dress, and Sharon felt Brenda's nipples harden instantly, pressing insistently into the captain's back.

A thrilling panic coursed through Sharon's body and she stood up straight, as if she'd been shocked. "Morales!" she exclaimed incongruously.

It took several seconds for Brenda to register that the older woman had said anything at all, so wrapped up was she in the way the redhead's tongue was stroking inside the other young woman's mouth. She hadn't realized how much she missed the way it felt to be kissed like that until it was on display for her, tempting her like a cake in the window of a bakery. Registering the way Sharon had shifted against her, Brenda finally blinked and looked away from the enthusiastic couple, her eyes focusing on Sharon's mouth. Had she ever looked so intently at the shape of Sharon's lips? She didn't think so, nor did she think that she'd ever wanted to kiss her as badly as she did right at that moment.

It occurred to her then that the reason she had looked at Sharon's mouth to begin with was because it had spoken. "Huh?" she asked, her mind hazy with thoughts of how good of a kisser Sharon Raydor must be.

There was a flicker of panic in Sharon's eyes and then, just as quickly, it was replaced by awkward reservation. "We should look for Morales."

The blonde nodded mutely, taking a distancing step back to give herself a chance to scan her eyes over the roomful of people. She craned her neck and looked amidst the jumping swarm of dancers who were loudly singing about how girls just wanted to have fun. She couldn't see the medical examiner but wasn't actively trying to find him either, deciding instead to give them both the space they both clearly needed. Brenda felt intensely overheated, her body buzzing with an entirely different type of unspent energy. Brown eyes darted quickly to observe the captain and was relieved to see that Sharon appeared to be in a similar state.

Brenda laughed to herself. She could only imagine what her answer would be when her mother inevitably questioned her about how her night had been. The words _fun_ and _interesting_ flitted about in her mind, but the one that continued to resurface was _arousing_-and that was something her mother just didn't need to know.

"Let's look out by the bar," Sharon suggested, her lips dangerously close to Brenda's ear.

Brenda nodded and before she could wonder if Sharon would avoid touching her, their hands met and instinctively clasped together.

The blue room had become considerably more busy, a minor detail that both Sharon and Brenda had been too distracted to notice. Sharon snuck a glance at her watch; it was the hour that most clubbers flocked to their Saturday night havens, leaving her with an itchy feeling of claustrophobia and a wave of antisocial distaste. She suddenly found herself longing for her bed, not only to rest her aching legs and feet, but to tend to other pressing aches without the confusing and tempting form of Brenda Leigh at her side.

"Wait here," Brenda said once they'd emerged into the less-crowded hall. "I'll get us some water."

Sharon nodded, allowing the younger woman to fight her way through thirsty dancers for an overpriced bottle of water. She narrowed her eyes, giving her eyes a moment to adjust to the change in lighting. Slinking back against the wall to support her weary frame, Sharon took a long, bracing breath and cursed her sex-starved body for reacting to Brenda's the way it had. She knew she'd been completely obvious, just in the way Brenda had been.

_But,_ prompted the rational little voice in the back of her mind,_ did you react to her because she was in the right place at the right time, or did you react because it's_ Brenda?

Sharon pushed the thought away. That was decidedly not a train of thought that she wished to pursue.

To the older woman's relief, she spotted the pathologist across the room when a group of older leather-clad men headed for the stairwell. Thankful for the distraction, she waved her arm in her hope of attracting his attention.

And then she froze, her arm elevated mid-air.

At that precise moment, Brenda reappeared at her side with a single bottle of water. "You would not believe how much they charge-Shar? What's goin' on?"

Sharon immediately retracted her arm, hugging it to her chest, her face taking on an expression of horrified disbelief. Brenda leaned in and peered in the direction that had caught Sharon's focus. "Oh for heaven's sake..." she exclaimed when she spotted him. "What on earth is Danny doin' here?"

"More importantly," Sharon said, her voice low and steely, "what is he doing with _Morales_?"

The captain grabbed Brenda's hand and took off so fast that she wrenched the blonde's arm painfully in its socket, but Brenda limited her protest to an exaggerated frown, so intrigued was she by the scene unfolding before her.

Sharon grasped her son's elbow and yanked him toward her body, clearly in full lioness-protecting-her-cub mode. "What the _hell_ is going on here?" she demanded in a strident tone Brenda hadn't heard since a certain memorable occasion ("I must go _first_! My investigation must go_ first_!") in Will's office.

Fiery green eyes bored into the startled, semi-intoxicated pathologist, but Brenda focused on Daniel, who looked equal parts taken aback and amused. "Mom?" He peered around her shoulder, his eyebrows creeping up his forehead. "And Brenda?"

She smiled and lifted the hand still clutching the water bottle in greeting.

The color was draining from Morales's face beneath his ever-present tan. "_Mom?_" he repeated.

"Step away from my son," Sharon returned, her voice every bit as dangerous as if she held her weapon, and Morales responded exactly as if she did, shuffling to the side and lifting his hands.

"Jesus, Mom - this is really embarrassing," Danny muttered. "What the hell are you doing?"

"What the hell am_ I _doing?" Sharon's eyes widened with incredulity. "What the hell are _you_ doing?"

"I was just going to ask to buy him a drink, I swear," Morales muttered pitifully, shooting the older woman a look that was half resentful, half terrified.

"And I was going to decline, politely - Sorry, man," Daniel added, making eye contact with the pathologist, who nodded.

"You have a boyfriend," Sharon continued sternly.

"I do," the younger man agreed mildly.

"And _you_ are much too old for him," she went on, pivoting to address Morales. "He's a child!"

"I'm twenty-five!" Danny yelped defensively. "And look at you, robbing the cradle, you hypocrite."

Sharon stared back, mystified, and Daniel pointed a single finger at Brenda. The captain scowled fiercely. "I'll deal with you later," she promised her son. "You, however -" She plucked Morales's plastic cup of whatever from his fingers. "I'll deal with you now. Hitting on college boys like some old lech isn't going to bring Kyle back. If this is how you're going to behave, we're leaving."

Brenda looked on wide-eyed, expecting some sort of wildly affronted outburst. Instead Morales's shoulders slumped. "You're right. I'm just really not ready for this after all. Sorry, Sharon. Sorry, um -"

"Daniel," the other man reminded with a slight smile, extending his hand to shake. "Nice to meet you." He gave the two women a wary side-eye. "And no offense, but I didn't come here to hang out with my aged P. So -"

With an eye-roll, Sharon waved him away, and Daniel disappeared eagerly into the crowd.

Brenda's gaze shifted expectantly between her companions. This evening was just turning out to be full of surprises. "So, uh, what now?"

The brunette looked questioningly at Morales and cocked her head.

"You two wanna come back to my place?" he asked despondently. "There's a twenty-four-hour convenience store on the corner; they've got an impressive selection of ice cream. And it's been a while since I watched my DVD of _Beaches_."

To her credit, Sharon didn't laugh. She nodded sympathetically and rubbed his arm. "Sure. Brenda?"

Her curls bounced. "I'm in."

They began to wend their slow way toward the exit. As they shuffled along, Morales said, "You know, Sharon, you can't ever bring this unfortunate event up again. You promised."

At her raised eyebrow, Brenda nodded in confirmation. "Whatever happens in Throb, stays in Throb, remember?"

"That's absurd. That was before I knew you intended to molest my son."

"That's harsh, captain. Younger men love me. And you might want to rethink that stance," Morales replied ominously, appearing to recover a bit of his usual spark, and Sharon lanced into him with a very skeptical look. "Oh, I suppose you think I didn't notice you two earlier?"

Sharon's expression didn't change, but there was no way she could hide her blush. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't you? You do realize you're still holding hands, right?" he pointed out, smirking knowingly.

The older woman flung the blonde's hand away as if it had burned her, and Brenda pouted.

"You're right," Sharon decreed, picking up the pace as they neared the blessed red light of the Exit sign, the others stumbling to keep up with her. "Whatever happens in Throb, stays in Throb."


	12. Chapter 12

**Title: Since You Went Away - Chapter Twelve: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, iThe Closer/i**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 8027**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Thanks to everyone for your continued support and lovely comments - they keep us typing! Also, this chapter is brought to you by the People for the Equitable Treatment of Animals. Don't forget to spay or neuter your pets.**

Filling her lungs with the sweet, earthy aroma of lemongrass, Sharon Raydor closed her eyes and surrendered herself completely to the sensation of her lungs expanding. Her legs trembled slightly, as they did whenever she was in a headstand, but she tingled with pride at her ability to maintain this particular posture for more than thirty seconds as she had when she was a beginning yogi. Inverted asanas had been daunting in the beginning, but she now revelled in them-controlling the entirety of her body from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes made her feel powerful, charged with vibrant energy that allowed her to release the tension and negativity she'd harbored between practices.

She exhaled slowly through her nose, focusing completely on the way it felt to be just a woman doing a headstand in her living room on a Friday night. In the time she allotted for herself to practice yoga, she could forget that she was Captain Sharon Raydor, mother of two and grandmother of one and head of an entire division and best friend to a woman who had overtaken the majority of her thoughts. She simply _was_, and that was exactly what she needed.

On her third deep inhalation, the squeak of brakes outside broke her concentration. She frowned and carefully lowered her legs to the mat, lifting her head to peer out the window. The running motor was too close to be parked in front of the neighbor's house and she knew, the way she always knew, that there was only one person who would show up at her house unannounced at 11:30 at night.

Sharon padded barefoot to the door, brushing aside a wisp of hair that had fallen loose from her ponytail, and pulled it open before the blonde had a chance to knock.

"Oh! Hey there!" Brenda exclaimed, her fist still poised in the air. Her red-rimmed eyes were wide and her cheeks were flushed and Sharon could smell the wine on her breath.

"Brenda?" Sharon narrowed her eyes in concern and looked over the blonde's shoulder at the cab driver who was ambling up her driveway. "Come inside," she said, guiding the woman past her with a hand at the small of her back. Brenda tripped over her feet as she walked inside and Sharon frowned.

"Hey, lady?" the driver said, his Russian accent thick. He extended a handful of bills. "She give me too much." Thrusting the money into Sharon's hand, he retreated back to his car.

Sharon looked at the wad of twenties and stepped back inside, tucking the money into Brenda's purse that had been abandoned on the floor. She worried her lip as she went into the living room, where she found Brenda sprawled on the couch. "Are you all right?"

"Is that a trick question?" Brenda asked, watching the flicker of the lemongrass candle on the coffee table. "I ruined your night, didn't I?" she questioned, taking note of the yoga mat on the floor and finally noticing the outfit the captain was wearing: black yoga pants and a yellow sports bra. Brenda's eyes widened again and she stared blatantly at her chest.

The younger woman's intent gaze had an immediate affect upon the captain, causing her nipples to tighten and pebble against the spandex. Remembering that this was the exact reason why she'd been doing yoga in the first place, Sharon coughed and reached for a zip-up sweater on the back of the sofa. She thrust her arms into the sleeves and zipped it up, hiding her breasts from Brenda's view, and sat down beside her. "Brenda, what happened?"

"I didn't feel like goin' home."

As answers went, it would do for the moment. With a nod, Sharon sauntered into the kitchen and returned a moment later with tall glasses of iced green tea for both of them. Brenda's head was tipped to the side, her cheek pillowed on Sharon's wheat-colored throw - probably leaving a makeup smudge - and her eyes closed. They opened when the glasses clinked softly against the coffee table.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome." Instinctively the captain reached up, tugging her hair free of its elastic band and fluffing it around her face. It had been a stressful week for her: lots of court appearances; lots of face time with cagey, irate attorneys; lots of meetings with the Pope. And then there was that other tight, spiky ball of stress she'd been carrying around in the pit of her stomach since last Saturday night, the one she didn't care to put a name to. She didn't normally do yoga this late, but desperate times, etc. Besides, she'd only arrived home from work a little over an hour earlier, her back aching from hours spent hunkered over her desk.

Somehow she rather suspected an entirely different type of stress had brought Brenda Leigh to her door tonight. Sharon tucked herself into the opposite corner of the sofa, drawing one leg up beneath her, and surveyed her friend. Her skin was porcelain-pale, her eyes deeply shadowed with fatigue and sorrow, and she was picking restlessly at her cuticles.

Feeling Sharon's eyes on her, Brenda looked over and blinked slowly a couple of times, struggling to focus sharply. She was definitely intoxicated, but far from wasted, and Sharon wondered vaguely how much she'd had to drink. Probably enough to make her realize that she wasn't going to be able to consume enough to make her forget. The older woman knew that feeling.

_And so she came here_, the brunette thought, and there was no point in trying to convince herself that she was annoyed. She was too pleased that Brenda had come here, to her. She'd much rather have the younger blonde in her presence than have the uninterrupted time and solitude she needed to remind herself that she shouldn't be devoting so many of her thoughts and so much of her energy to a certain deputy chief.

"Can I get you something else, Brenda Leigh? A snack?"

Brenda emitted a quiet little sound that Sharon interpreted as a negative, and she didn't push, although she'd ply her with water later, and something carb-heavy - crackers, maybe, or rice cakes. Instead she tilted her own head, mirroring the other woman's posture, and let her eyelids droop to half-mast as she took in those regular features. "All right, then."

Silence wrapped loosely around the two women. Sharon watched the candle flame dance and listened to Brenda inhale and exhale very slowly, very deeply, over and over, filling her lungs with the spicy-sweet scent.

Finally Brenda released a last, trembling breath. "It was a bad one, Sharon."

Sharon sipped her tea, waiting for the other woman to go on. When she didn't, Sharon thoughtfully cradled her glass in both hands and asked, "Do you want to tell me about it?"

The blonde cleared her throat and shifted restlessly on the sofa before finally twisting her body to face Sharon's. The look in her eyes was haunted. "Mother of two killed her little girls and then herself." She blinked back a tear. "Beat 'em to death with a hammer and then shot herself."

"Jesus," Sharon said, the icy sting of disgust and horror settling in the pit of her stomach.

"It was...it was a mess. We're lookin' into why she did it but there's just no answer good enough to explain it." Brenda's eyes swelled with tears once more and she wiped at her nose with the back of her sleeve. "What kinda mother does that to her babies? The youngest one...she was no bigger than Clarissa. What kinda woman was she to save the bullet for herself and make them suffer the way she did?" She started crying then, huge, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. "I'm sorry. I'm just so...angry! I'm disgusted."

"Don't apologize, Brenda," Sharon replied, extending a hand to smooth through blonde hair. "Some cases are too much. There's no way to make sense out of something like this."

"There was so much blood," the deputy chief continued with a sniffle, shaking her head. "Some days I just really hate my job."

Sharon scratched her nails gently against Brenda's scalp as she soothed the blonde tresses, her own eye prickling with emotion at the thought of something her brain struggled to fathom. Her heart ached for them, for everyone involved, and for Brenda, who had tried to drink away the horrific scene of a dead family. "I know," she said, because she did. They were the ones you could never truly shake.

Brenda choked out a sob. "I'm so sorry," Brenda muttered again, sniffing loudly as she turned her body to collapse against Sharon's. She buried her face in the crook of Sharon's neck and cried. "I just didn't know where to go."

"Right here," Sharon answered simply, wrapping her arms tightly around Brenda's shoulders. "You should always come here."

"But you-"

"No 'buts'." The captain resumed stroking Brenda's hair and rocked her gently in her arms, the way she had whenever her children had nightmares. She'd never had someone to comfort her after a brutal case like this and had relied solely on her psychiatrist, keeping the darker aspects of her job hidden from her husband and friends. However, as surely as she knew that Brenda would now come to her, Sharon was certain that she'd turn to the deputy chief in times of crisis. The memories of a time when they didn't trust each other seemed to be out of a movie; they no longer seemed to belong to her. Had there ever been a time when she hadn't needed and been needed like this?

Sharon held Brenda for some time, rubbing her back and caressing her hair until the younger woman no longer cried. Even when Brenda's tears no longer soaked the cotton of her sweater and her hands slackened their tight grip on her waist, Sharon kept her close, not wanting to jostle the fragile woman until she was ready.

"I'm so tired," Brenda said with a sigh, her warm breath tickling Sharon's collarbone. "Musta been all that wine."

"You've had a long day, Brenda. Why don't you take a shower? I'll get you some pajamas and we can get you to bed."

Brenda trembled as she slowly pulled back, her eyes glossy. "Will you stay with me tonight, Sharon? Can I sleep with you?" The blonde licked her lips and cast her eyes away. "I don't think I can face those nightmares alone."

"Of course, Brenda Leigh. You don't have to go through any of that alone."

Brenda was embarrassed as soon as she had asked, but, thanks to the Merlot she'd downed before coming over here, not embarrassed enough to retract her request. With one last gentle squeeze of her shoulder, Sharon got up and disappeared down the hall to the bathroom, and the younger woman heard doors and cabinets opening and closing. "Brenda," that low, soothing voice called, and Brenda followed it unquestioningly.

There was another candle burning in the bathroom, although Brenda didn't catch the scent right away because her sinuses were clogged from her recent bout of tears; and a thick, inviting-looking towel awaited her on the counter. Next to it was a pair of midnight blue silk pajamas. "Those will be a little big on you," Sharon said, gracefully backing out into the hallway, "but I think you'll manage. Take as long as you want. Stay until you turn into a prune, if you'd like," she invited with a gentle smile.

Brenda managed her own wobbly smile. "Like Clarissa?"

"Yes, and you already know where the bath toys are."

When the door closed behind Sharon, Brenda Leigh reached up to remove her top, and then let her arms fall back to her sides when she shivered. No, she'd turn the shower on first, get it nice and hot; alone again, she found she was suddenly chilled. In fact, as she twisted them together, her fingers felt so icy cold that she wondered if they'd ever be warm again, or if today's events had frozen her straight through. She was afraid to close her eyes, so she fixed them unnaturally wide open, gazing vacantly at the dancing candle flame and thinking of Sharon's strong, delicate arms holding her firmly, thinking of the spicy, clean scent of her skin, ginger and a hint of something Brenda couldn't identify. The older woman had held Brenda and rocked her and soothed her in a way no one but Brenda's mother had ever done before. It wasn't that Sharon's embrace actually felt anything like Willie Rae's, or that the sensory experience was at all similar; but somehow Brenda recognized a kinship in the way these two women had held and comforted her. There was a quiet strength, a confidence. Was it a maternal thing? she asked herself as she finally stepped under the shower spray, now almost hot enough to scald. Was there a certain kind of caring and nurturing that you somehow absorbed and diffused once you'd mothered a child, some special secret knowledge she'd unwittingly foregone?

The water droplets turned Brenda's pale skin a splotchy pink as she watched, oddly fascinated. She felt as if her bones and muscles might melt, and her entire body swirl down the drain with the bathwater.

Brenda folded her arms over her breasts and gripped her own sides. She imagined holding Sharon the way the captain had held her, and for some reason the thought made her smile even as tears the same temperature as the water stung her eyes. She thought she could do that.

Eventually she realized she needed to bathe before her exhausted legs refused to hold her upright any longer, and she reached blindly for the shampoo. It smelled like Sharon - the other way around, really, but that was how Brenda thought of it: the shampoo smelled like Sharon - and that provided its own kind of comfort. This was what she needed: Sharon's calm, Sharon's constant, quiet strength and tenacity. She wanted to wrap herself in it, drink it in the green tea, see it in the flickering candle flame, absorb it through the older woman's skin, and forget this terrible day.

When Brenda stepped out of the shower, she realized she'd turned Sharon's bathroom into a sauna, but somehow the candle was still burning. Brenda breathed deeply. Jasmine, she thought. The candle smelled like jasmine. She'd never be able to smell that flowery scent without thinking of Sharon.

When Brenda emerged from the bathroom some minutes later, she had braided her hair in pigtails (secured by little plastic bands that she'd found in the drawer, undoubtedly belonging to Clarissa) and donned Sharon's silk pajamas. It occurred to her that even if her friend had suggested she sleep in the guest room, she would have still felt her presence in the decadently soft whisper of fabric against her bare skin. It was almost like the extension of an embrace, one Brenda could carry with her.

In the hallway, dimmed now by the extinguished light of the living room, Brenda paused and took a breath, her heart beating slightly faster now that she was faced with sharing a bed with Sharon Raydor. Despite her nerves, the deputy chief knew she couldn't face the night alone.

Sharon was setting down a glass of water on the right bedside table when Brenda timidly entered the room, her head suddenly feeling light and full of air. The older woman watched her and smiled. "How do you feel?"

"Warm," Brenda replied, and she was surprised to discover that it was the truth. When had that icy chill left her? "And dizzy." She laughed breathlessly, crossing the room and standing on the left side of the bed.

Sharon stirred. "Why don't you lay down? Over here, I mean. That's my side."

"You sleep alone and you have a side?" Brenda asked, crawling onto the bed and scooting her way over to the right. She knelt on the bed in front of the other woman. "You sure you don't mind me sharin' with you?"

"Not at all," Sharon replied at once. "I don't even mind that you're dripping all over my favorite silk pajamas." She fingered one of the wet braids and smiled. "I set out some tylenol and water for you. I think you'll probably need it."

"I'm not that bad off," Brenda promised, burrowing beneath the sheets.

"I know. Just in case."

While Brenda sipped at the water, she watched Sharon busy herself around the room. She'd already changed into a pair of linen bottoms and a t-shirt, leaving Brenda to wonder if Sharon had sacrificed her nightly comforts to make her comfortable. Allowing her to show up on her doorstep had been a generous act in itself, and Brenda's stomach tingled pleasantly at the knowledge that once again, Sharon had been looking out for her best interest.

Sharon turned out the light and got into bed, surprised by how _noticeable _it was that she wasn't alone. The dip on Brenda's side of the mattress and the warmth already generated beneath the comforter made Sharon's heart pound, reminding her once again just how long it had been since anyone had lain beside her. She took a deep breath and hoped that Brenda couldn't hear the thunderous thud of her heart.

"You're so good to me," Brenda said with a sigh, shifting her body onto her side. The position undoubtedly served to make the younger woman more comfortable but had, at the same time, brought her closer to Sharon. "What would I do without you?"

"Lucky for both of us that we won't have to find out," Sharon quipped back, staring ahead into the darkness.

The bed rustled and suddenly a damp braid was tickling Sharon's neck, though the older woman didn't notice. She was too focused on the face that was mere inches above her own, her breath sweet with wine and the faintest hint of mouthwash. "Thank you, Sharon," Brenda whispered. She leaned down and pressed her lips to Sharon's cheek, her mouth lingering for several seconds longer than perhaps it should have.

Sharon held her breath until Brenda lowered herself back to the bed. "Sweet dreams, Brenda Leigh," she whispered. She didn't sleep until well after the other woman succumbed to the blissful pull of drowsiness.

When she awoke, Brenda knew immediately, without even having to open her eyes, that she was alone, not just in the bed but in the room. She felt the captain's absence the same way she'd felt her presence during the night, reassured by the simple solidity of the other woman's body on the other side of the mattress whenever she jolted awake from vague, horrible dreams that merged with disquieting seamlessness into her own memories of the previous day.

Morales had had tears in his eyes when Brenda went down to the morgue - alone, because she wouldn't ask any of the guys to accompany her, not on this errand - and hadn't bothered wiping them away as he and the deputy chief had stared at one another in stolid misery. "The little one died almost instantly; her skull was still soft," he'd said, his gaze trained on the slightly larger of the two sheet-covered forms, both pitifully tiny on the autopsy tables. "The older sister... took a while."

Brenda had, at least, made it to the bathroom before she'd thrown up.

She sat up now in Sharon's bed in Sharon's bedroom in Sharon's cozy house, staring at the warm green walls and the framed photograph of the twins on the dresser, and telling herself to see these things instead of all that blood, too much blood, painted incongruously around a cheerfully messy child's bedroom.

Brenda felt her feet underneath her on the floor before she was aware that she'd decided to get up, and tiptoed out into the hall to find Sharon. The hardwood was cool against her soles and squeaked reassuringly, reminding her of how long this house had stood here. She stopped suddenly, reversing, and walked into the bedroom Sharon had set up for Clarissa. There were the stuffed animals in the crib, the soft green and yellow blanket that was surely handmade, and, best of all, the glorious flowers painted near the ceiling, twining together in a playful garland of colors. Brenda stood there for a moment, and then she nodded to herself. Yes, this was what a little girl's bedroom was supposed to look like.

Sharon was in the kitchen, woolly socks on her feet and a soft gray sweater draped over her t-shirt-clad shoulders. She clutched an over-sized coffee mug in one hand and a spatula in the other, and when she caught sight of Brenda and smiled brightly, the younger woman's chest tightened almost painfully.

"Help yourself to coffee," the brunette invited, gesturing. "I'm making pancakes."

The smaller woman's countenance brightened. "Pancakes? I love pancakes."

Sharon smirked. "Somehow I suspected as much." Pouring batter into a sizzling skillet with one hand, she extended her coffee mug in the other. "Refill, please, ma'am. Milk, but just a little, and -"

Brenda waved her away. "I know, I know," she interrupted, almost affronted. "I do pay attention to you, you know."

Sharon looked over her shoulder, her green eyes narrowed slightly. "Yes," she said, her lips quirking in that mysterious little half smile, "I know."

When Sharon's mug was full again and Brenda had her own portion of the steaming liquid, she settled down at the table, propping her chin on her fist. "Thank you for letting me spend the night, Sharon."

Dark hair slipped over Sharon's shoulders as she nodded. "You're welcome, Brenda Leigh."

"I just... I couldn't go home. I mean, I did go home - Andy drove me - and it was so still, so empty, you know?" The deputy chief turned her dark red mug around and around in her hands, studying it. "I turned right around and called a cab. I waited outside until it came," she admitted, a little ashamed of her own weakness. She darted a quick look at Sharon to see how her friend received that news, but she simply nodded again. "Last night was the first time since I left that I've really missed bein' married."

At the stove, Sharon's whole body went still, but she didn't reply.

Ever attentive to detail, Brenda noticed the change in Sharon immediately. "I'm not sayin' I miss Fritz," Brenda quickly amended, though unsure why it was so important to her that Sharon understand her. "That ship has long since sailed, I assure you. I just miss the idea of marriage. No-you know what I think it is? It's havin' someone at the house to keep me company."

The brunette relaxed, unaware of the tension she'd been holding until she finally let it go. She flipped a pancake and turned to look at the other woman, who looked endearingly youthful with her hair in braids. "Sounds to me like you want a dog, not a husband."

Brenda laughed into her coffee cup. "I don't want either, thank you very much. But you know what I mean, though? I miss goin' home to someone who's glad to see me and who can make me feel better after a bad day."

"I told you that you can come here," Sharon began, and Brenda laughed again.

"I can't come here every single time somethin' gets to me at work. I'd always be here!"

_Is that such a bad thing?_ Sharon thought, and she eased the perfectly formed pancake onto a plate and poured another dollop of batter into the pan.

"Besides," the blonde continued, "eventually you're gonna want your privacy. The last thing you need is for me to come bargin' in while you're entertainin' a man..."

Sharon raised an eyebrow. The very idea of enjoying a man's company enough to invite him home with her seemed a foreign concept, something that had no place in her future. She gave a disbelieving chuckle. "I don't think we have to worry about that being an issue."

"You say that now..." Brenda teased, smiling brightly. Why should she feel relieved that Sharon had no prospects of dating someone? Furthermore, why had she been jealous to have introduced the possibility in the first place? Deciding a change of subject was in order, Brenda set down her mug and came up behind Sharon, peering down at the bubbling batter on the skillet. "These smell amazin'! What's in 'em?"

Sharon smirked. "Banana and chocolate chips."

The blonde gaped. "Really?"

"Pancakes are a serious business, Brenda Leigh. Would I lie?"

Brenda stuck a finger in the batter and licked it clean, moaning at the taste of the fruit. "I think I love you, Sharon Raydor. You're a marvel."

The captain blushed and flipped the pancake. "I thought you could use something special for breakfast."

The younger woman bit her lip, her face warming pleasantly. "You're far too good to me." She squeezed Sharon's shoulder and went over to the fridge in search of syrup, feeling marginally guilty over the fact that she was allowing herself to be spoiled by her friend. "I promise I'll get outta your hair after breakfast. I don't wanna get in the way of your weekend plans."

"You're never in the way, Brenda, I assure you. I had nothing much planned anyway."

"Nothin' much? Oh, but that means that you _did_ have somethin' planned!"

The brunette chuckled at the other woman's surge of guilt. "I hardly consider filling out paperwork and watching _The Sopranos_ to be plans. You could join me if you wanted."

Brenda scrunched her nose in distaste. "I think I need a day not to think about work at all."

It was the sort of simple admission that spoke volumes, the sort that Sharon completely understood. Brenda did not have to elaborate; Sharon had gone through enough difficult cases to know when sometimes, work needed to be left at work. She could completely identify with Brenda's desire to spend the day as _Brenda_, a woman without the type of responsibility that required her presence at murder scenes. Of course, Sharon could not control the people of Los Angeles and had no power over any emergency calls either of them might receive, but she was more than willing to put off her paperwork until tomorrow and give her friend exactly what she needed.

Well, maybe not _exactly_...

"All right then," Sharon announced, stacking another pancake onto the plate. She stirred the batter and poured a little more into the pan. "The captain and deputy chief are taking the day off, and I know exactly what we're going to do."

"Oooh, what is it?" Brenda asked excitedly, the way she might enquire whether or not she was receiving a pony for Christmas.

"It's a surprise."

"Can I have a hint? Just a little one?"

Sharon's eyes twinkled. "Nope." So saying, the captain placed the platter on the table and sat down across from Brenda, stabbing at the little stack of pancakes she'd assembled on her own plate. Idly she wondered how long it had been since she'd made these. Her kids had always loved them, and they'd become a Raydor family celebration food. Birthdays, straight-A report cards, dance recitals: all had meant chocolate chip banana pancakes.

Sharon took a bite and one of her molars twinged. Jesus, they were sweet. No wonder Brenda Leigh was wolfing her share down. When it came to this sort of thing, she seemed to have the palate of a child.

But not one of Sharon's children. The captain looked at the pale blonde sitting across from her in the morning sunlight, devouring the sweet, sticky concoction. Had she been trying to mother Brenda, make it all better with a hug and an unhealthy meal and a surprise outing?

Vivien loved surprises. Daniel had always been rather more cautious, wanting to know exactly what lay before him so he could adjust to it. It was both a part of the necessary coping mechanism and a part of the pleasure, the anticipation. He was like his mother that way.

As Sharon put her fork down and sipped her coffee, glad to banish the sickly sweet taste of the pancakes from her mouth, she knew perfectly well that she didn't view Brenda as some sort of surrogate daughter. She wasn't trying to help Brenda because she'd been totally incapable of helping her child.

The reality was, perhaps, more disturbing. Sharon stood up abruptly. "I need to shower. Eat all you want."

Brenda's dark eyes widened in surprise. "But you barely ate anything," she protested around a mouthful. She'd never had such wonderful pancakes; this was obviously some sort of sorcery.

Sharon shrugged, her supple lips compressed into a thin line. "I don't care for them. I'd forgotten."

Brenda was still sitting at the table when Sharon reemerged, fully clothed and made up and feeling more like herself with her customary armor in place. The blonde hugged her knees to her chest, her bare feet balanced on the edge of the chair. "Maybe I should go," she suggested, having picked up on the abrupt change in her friend's mood but unable to identify the cause.

"No, I told you, I have a surprise planned." The older woman offered a slight smile, not terribly different from the ones Chief Johnson had grown used to receiving from Captain Raydor when she handed her paperwork in on time or refrained from yanking down that annoying red crime scene tape. "But afterwards I probably should do my paperwork."

Of course, Sharon and her paperwork. Brenda nodded, her expression neutral, reminding herself that she'd barged in on the other woman's weekend plans. "I'll just get dressed and we can be on our way to.. wherever."

Sharon nodded in turn and began to gather up the dirty dishes.

"Don't do that!" Brenda exclaimed so vehemently that Sharon spun on one ballet flat-encased foot, and the younger woman faltered slightly. "I mean, you cooked, so I'll clean up." She glanced down at her attire. "Uh, Sharon? You don't have somethin' I could wear, do you? Unless my suit's okay," she hastened to add.

Sharon smirked, and it was Sharon again, not Captain Raydor. "Hop in the shower. I'll find you something. - Something that doesn't have to be dry-cleaned."

For the second time in 12 hours, Brenda Leigh found herself naked in Sharon's house, standing beneath the hot spray of the shower, her thoughts focused on the other woman. She worried her lip between her teeth as she ran over the events of the morning in an attempt to recall what had caused Sharon to retreat into her shell. Brenda had been especially grateful and courteous with her friend; she hadn't pushed her and had been mindful about not putting Sharon out (aside from the part when she showed up at her door and asked to share her bed). So why did she have the nagging feeling that she'd done something wrong?

She was quick with her morning ablutions, wrapping the fuzzy red towel around her body and brushing her teeth with the spare toothbrush she'd left there after the sleepover with Clarissa. When she stepped into the hallway, she heard the water running in the kitchen. "You better not be doin' those dishes!" she yelled out, knowing that Sharon probably _was _elbow-deep in soap suds. Rather than investigate, Brenda opted not to drip all over the hardwood floors and ran down to Sharon's room.

True to her word, Sharon had set out some clothes: a pair of black track pants and a white t-shirt. It was strange to wear Sharon's pajamas to bed, but it was something altogether different to wear her clothes during the day when she'd be aware of the other woman's smell. It was an intimate gesture, one that accompanied the many other acts of kindness that Sharon had bestowed upon her since she'd arrived. Sharon had managed, in a way that Brenda could not conceive or understand, to give her exactly what she had needed. She hadn't expected anything more than a miserable night in Sharon's guest room and had received unconditional comfort instead. It had been more than anyone had ever done for her without expecting anything in return.

Brenda was pulling her wet hair into a messy bun when she entered the kitchen, unsurprised to find that the dishes had been cleaned and were now drying in the rack. The younger woman rolled her eyes. "I said I would do them," she said, looking on as Sharon squeezed the excess water from the sponge.

"I know, but I wanted to avoid having to wash them again later." Sharon turned around and smirked at Brenda's glare. "Are you ready for your surprise?"

"Uh, Sharon," Brenda began, eyes widening as she stared at the "City of Los Angeles Animal Services" sign by the parking lot they were currently pulling into. She stared dumbly at a man carrying a little toy poodle in his arms."What's goin' on?"

"I would think that's rather obvious," Sharon replied with a smirk.

"Are we gettin' you a pet?"

"No," Sharon firmly answered. "We are getting _you_ a pet."

"But...I don't think I'm even allowed to have animals in my apartment." She peered out the window at the large building and then again at the man with the poodle, gawking as he kissed its furry head and gently set it on the passenger seat of his jeep. Her heart pounded a little faster at the thought of the shelter full of caged animals, a deep mixture of guilt and excitement and anxiety swelling in her chest. "Are we really doin' this?"

"We're really doing this." Sharon turned off the car. "That is, unless you hate the idea of once again being a cat owner."

Brenda bit her lip as her cheeks flushed with unbridled excitement. "When you want to make someone feel better, you don't mess around, do you?" She giggled breathlessly, squirming like a child in her seat. "Some people give flowers...you give kittens."

Inside, the main animal control facility of the City of Los Angeles was barely controlled chaos. The outer waiting room was filled with people, some with their newly adopted pets, and from down the hall assorted barks, yowls, yips, and meows blended into a cacophanous roar. At Sharon's feet, a German shepherd leapt at a young woman who had just received a sturdy cardboard carrier containing a chubby calico. Both woman and cat jumped in surprise, the human protectively hugging the feline to her breast.

The captain curled her lip in distaste. "Maybe we shouldn't have come on a Saturday."

Brenda's melting eyes were fastened on a little girl and boy squirming with anticipation, dutifully restraining their squeals of excitement as a scrubs-clad employee walked their new dog toward them on a lead. The black puppy was all huge, floppy ears and oversized paws. "No, you were right," the blonde insisted. "This is exactly what I need." She nudged Sharon's shoulder and nodded toward the children and their puppy. "Look. Now, _that_ is adorable; even you have to admit it."

Certainly it was, but Sharon only cocked her chin and replied, "Everyone wants a puppy or a kitten. - Come on, let's go back."

The two women followed the signs through a fire door and down a long hallway that smelled strongly of disinfectant overlaying the inevitable odor of too many animals confined in a small space. Brenda eagerly opened a second door labeled "CATS (Down Hall for Dogs)."

For a couple of seconds Sharon was overwhelmed by the volume of sound, the pungent odors, and the Saturday morning crowd of prospective pet-owners drifting from cage to cage. Brenda lit up like sunshine, her fingers sinking into her companion's upper arm like talons. "Look, Sharon, _kittens_!"

The taller woman turned to her friend, her expression incredulous. Brenda's eyes glowed, and her cheeks were flushed. It was disconcerting, really, seeing such a wholesale change overtake the deputy chief. The blonde knelt in front of one of the cages - good thing Sharon had just lent her track pants that could be tossed into the washer - bringing herself to eye level with four little balls of fluff.

Brenda bit her lip. "I'm surprised there are still kittens here...you'd think all the eager little kids would've scooped them up by now," she mused, poking her finger between the slats of the cage, just out of reach of the nearest ball of orange fur. "Hey there, kitty!" The kitten gave a disinterested mewl and returned to its grooming.

"I imagine there are always animals coming and going," the older woman said. She scanned the nearby crates, noting that some were empty and others were filled with litters of cats of various shapes, colors, and sizes. "Let's take a look at the rest of them."

They moved down the hall, taking time to stop at the less-visited cages. The kittens were the most popular, fawned over by children and adults alike. Brenda beamed at them all, her heart twisting at the realization that she couldn't take them all home with her. "I've never done this before, you know," she finally admitted, pausing to allow a hyper tabby cat to extend its paw and swat at her hand. "I'm sort of an accidental cat owner. I've never gone out and _chosen _one." She turned wide eyes toward her friend. "How do you choose? How do I know which one's the right one?"

"Think about what you're looking for in a cat. Kittens are pretty high maintenance and require a lot of attention."

Brenda twisted her lips into a frown. "Mmm. I'm not so sure how much time I've got to devote to a kitten with work and no one to look after him while I'm busy."

"So perhaps a young kitten is not the best choice."

"But they're _so cute_." Sharon raised an eyebrow and Brenda sighed. "All right, all right. I get the point." She moved on, kneeling down in front of a cage that contained a docile-looking gray cat. It blinked up at her with her with its one shining blue eye. "Awe, Sharon, look at this one...she's beautiful." She tugged the older woman's hand, pulling her to crouch beside her while she read the little placard fixed to the cage. "She's a ragdoll and she's six years old. Awe...and she was neglected by her owners and lost her eye in a gang fight."

"A gang fight?" Sharon questioned.

"Well...close enough," Brenda teased. "She's been here for ages...poor little thing."

The cat _was_ beautiful, its fur slightly patchy, the scar across its left eye puffy but healed. The cat blinked at Sharon, eyeing her with curiosity, and the older woman frowned. She was most certainly not the one leaving here with a pet.

Brenda gasped and Sharon pulled her attention away from the ragdoll to see the blonde kneeling on the cold concrete floor, pressing her face close to the cage beside her. "Isn't she pretty?" Brenda cooed. The cat, no more than ten months old, was white and gray, peppered with black spots. The card identified it as an Egyptian Mau.

"Beautiful," Sharon admitted, leaning down to peer at the cat's slender body and exotic, dramatically pointed little chin.

"It's unusual for a pure-bred Mau to turn up," put in a third voice, and both women looked up at the man who had spoken. "She won't be here long. And yet, did you know that in Egypt there's such a huge population of Maus on the streets that they're considered pests, like rats or opossums? People often shoot at them, or poison them."

Brenda looked absolutely horrified. "Who in the world would try to kill this precious little baby?" she demanded, crouching in front of the cage as if to protect its occupant.

The man's teeth flashed white against his cocoa-colored skin. "Don't worry," he reassured in his pronounced West Indian accent, "that won't happen to this little girl. We just got her this morning, and I bet you she'll be gone by the end of the day."

The blonde turned those wide eyes on her companion. "Ten months old - that's not _really_ a kitten, is it? She's almost all grown up. She wouldn't need somebody around to look after her all the time, would she?"

The man shook his head, a knowing glint in his eyes. "If you plan to adopt, you need a form." He held out a clipboard containing a stack of papers. "It just asks for basic information about yourself and any other pets you may have, and then there's a spot at the bottom for you to list the animals you're interested in, in order of preference." He tapped the top right-hand corner of the card taped to a cage near his shoulder. "That's the I.D. number. When you've finished, take your form down to the desk, all right?"

Already scribbling on the form he'd handed her, using her own knee as a makeshift writing desk, Brenda flashed one of her extra bright smiles. "Thank you _so_ much."

"Wait," Sharon called as he turned away, surprising both herself and Brenda. "How long are the animals kept here before they're -?"

"Euthanized?" Jonas - that was what his name-tag said - supplied, and Sharon nodded. Brenda winced. "We keep them as long as we possibly can, depending on the volume of animals we're receiving. It tends to vary by season."

"So this one -" Sharon tapped the cage of the ragdoll as if at random, but she wasn't even fooling herself, let alone anyone else. "She's been here for nearly two months."

Jonas nodded. "Unfortunately, that's not unusual for older cats."

"But she's only six!" the brunette exclaimed indignantly. "That's barely even middle-aged for a cat, right?"

"Right. But really any of our animals over one or two -" He lifted his broad shoulders in a shrug. "Especially any that have health issues or behavioral problems."

"It doesn't say anything about that on her card," Sharon continued in the same tone, and in a low voice Brenda pointed out, "Sharon, she has _one eye_."

"Well, that's not her fault. She can see." Sharon danced her fingers across the metal bars and the animal followed the sound and movement eagerly, her ears pricked up and her one eye focused intently, readying her little body to spring. Of course, there was nowhere for her to go inside the cage.

"You can open the cage," Jonas volunteered helpfully, and both women looked up to see him manfully striving to contain a smirk. Green eyes narrowed at him in a glare, but then Sharon quickly returned her attention to the gray feline.

"Hi, pretty girl," the brunette cooed in a low, melodic voice Brenda had never heard her use before, not even with Cee, and it made her stomach twist strangely. The cat eyed Sharon's fingers warily for a long moment before rubbing up against them and emitting a cautious mewl.

The captain scratched gently, and the cat's purr was so loud that all three sets of human ears heard it. "What happened to her leg? She limps."

"That's another souvenir of her big day with the neighbors' dogs. Isn't it, girl?" Jonas knelt down, also reaching out to stroke the cat. "She still loves to play, though. And she's very affectionate, as you can see."

"You just need someone to love you, don't you?" Sharon murmured. "You've got plenty of life left in you, dontcha? So what if you're not a kitten." Her sharp green eyes focused on Jonas again. "How much longer will she be here?"

He gestured around the room. "Until all these cages fill up. Tuesday, maybe. Wednesday at the outside."

Brenda knew her own expression was horrified. Sharon's merely turned stony.

"Unless someone wants her," Jonas added.

Sharon stood up abruptly, slamming the cage door. Brenda looked at her in dismay, taking in the older woman's grim expression. "Sha-" she began to protest, but Sharon interrupted her.

"Give me the form," she said in her no-bullshit Captain Raydor tone.

"Are you sure?" Brenda asked.

"Give me the damn form," her friend repeated, scowling.

"You've never said anythin' about wantin' a pet," the blonde pointed out tentatively, rising to stand next to her as Sharon's bold handwriting rapidly covered the printed form.

"I want this one," the older woman returned in that same defiant tone. "Are you ready? Then let's go. There's no use wasting time." She strode briskly toward the door, but paused on the threshold, looking over her shoulder to add "Thank you, Jonas" in a much softer voice.

He smiled serenely at her, as if he saw this sort of Grinch-like behavior all the time. He probably did, but Sharon was damned if she was going to be another statistic. Mind firmly made up, she led the way to the front desk to turn in their paperwork for processing, actively avoiding meeting Brenda's gaze.

Brenda was practically swinging on her feet, sporting the biggest shit-eating grin Sharon had seen on her in ages. With a resolute sigh she turned to Brenda, saying, "Oh, out with it."

The blonde nearly exploded with glee. "I just never in a million years expected you to fall for a cat!"

"I did not _fall_ for her," Sharon insisted. She brushed her hair off her forehead and pursed her lips, reasonably adding, "It was a matter of life and death for her. They were going to put her down-oh, _why_ am I explaining this to you, you little hypocrite. You fell for a cat too."

"I know." Brenda smiled, wondering how much longer it would be before she could play with the cat. Would she like her new home? Would she claw up her beloved new sofa? Would she even _like_ her new mama? She bit her cheek and watched Sharon's expression mirroring her own. As soon as she knew that her friend was experiencing a similar 'expectant parent' mentality, her own anxiety ebbed. "This was a great idea."

"Are you feeling better?" Sharon asked, wrapping her arms around herself, wondering not for the first time if she had been too hasty in coming to Brenda's rescue. The hopeful expression on the younger woman's face was enough to allay her worries.

"That's a tricky word, isn't it-better? It's gonna take me a while to get over this case, but I think I'll be okay. At least I'll have someone to keep me company at 4 a.m. if I wake up from a nightmare." Brenda raised a teasing eyebrow. "That was your evil plan all along, wasn't it? Pawn me off on a cat to have your freedom again?"

"So much for my evil plan. I suppose the jig is up."

"Lucky for you that it worked."

Sharon let out a little sigh of relief. "Good. I think it would be better for both of us if I didn't receive texts in the middle of the night because you can't sleep."

"_Ever_? What if it's an emergency?"

"It depends on your definition of an emergency." The older woman laughed. "I'll draft a list of acceptable scenarios for you."

Brenda scrunched her nose. "Use those list-writin' skills of yours to think of all the things we need to get at Petco when we get outta here." She poked Sharon in the arm. "You're gonna get your kitty a giant cat bed, aren't you? You're gonna spoil the lil thing-I just know it!"

As an older woman leaned across the desk to explain the adoption process to them, now that she was no longer inundated by phone calls, a slightly jarring thought presented itself to Sharon like an epiphany.

She and Brenda Leigh were becoming middle-aged cat ladies.


	13. Chapter 13

**Title: Since You Went Away**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Pairing: Brenda/Sharon**

**Rating: T (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 6927**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Trigger warning: **_This chapter contains emotional material pertaining to character death and the grieving process._

**Author's Note:**_ i-must-go-first here. UbiquitousMixie has been having a rough week (albeit not as rough as Sharon's) - it would be pretty amazing if y'all sent some feedback her way to let her know how much you appreciate all her hard work and mad writing skills. Thank you** so** much; thank you. Also, this chapter goes out to mosaicburst, who hasn't had a stellar week either. I wish this chapter were a little cheerier for you, babe, but maybe it will help anyway. All your comments and support keep us writing._

__**Chapter Thirteen: Pillow Talk**

In this age of electronic communication, Brenda Leigh loved to get real mail. The only people who ever sent her any were her mama and, occasionally, her sister-in-law; but it was still always with an ounce of hopeful enthusiasm that she turned the tiny key in her mailbox and rooted through the bills, credit card offers, and delivery menus.

That evening she was in a hurry to get upstairs and see what new treasures (a dust bunny? a wine cork?) her as-yet-unnamed feline companion had discovered in her absence. Still, she paused when her fingertips brushed what was unmistakably a high-quality envelope, electric blue, shielding what felt like equally high-quality card stock. Shoving the rest of the detritus back into the box to be dealt with later, Brenda seized the envelope and started across the courtyard, examining her single proper piece of mail as she went.

Yes, those were her name and address written across the front in an unfamiliar looping hand - although, who (outside her family) would be addressing her as Brenda _Leigh_ Johnson? Puzzled and intrigued, she frowned at the return address, her eyes widening as she recognized what was a _very_ tony neighborhood. She'd gotten lost there once, in the early days, and it had taken Gabriel forty-five minutes to find her. Thank heavens for GPS. She certainly didn't know anyone who lived there.

She let herself into her apartment, employing the quick edge-in-sideways-and-slam-door process she'd developed to avoid having to chase her escape-artist cat around the building's grounds for another twenty minutes like she'd done Sunday evening in a mild state of panic because darkness had been falling. She was greeted by a volume of meows emitted, incredibly, from the small creature rubbing enthusiastically at her ankles.

"I know, sugar," she cooed, kneeling to stroke her new pet. "I know, sweetie. Are you starvin'? It's dinner time."

She left the envelope on the kitchen counter while she spooned half a can of the noxious-smelling concoction the cat coveted into her little dish and refilled her water bowl. Then she tore eagerly into the paper, belatedly noticing a small fleck of cat food marring the corner. Oh, well.

For a few seconds she was mystified. It was an invitation, certainly for a child's party, with a professional drawing of a tempting birthday cake. "You're invited!" it assured her.

"What in the wor -?" she asked, leaving the question unfinished as she read on.

_Clarissa's turning two! Help us celebrate_.

She stared at the invitation, startled and flattered in equal measures. She checked the date and realized it was the following afternoon. Brenda bit her lip. When was the last time she'd checked her mail, anyway?

There was a phone number to RSVP ("Call Paul and Helen"), and the deputy chief rooted in her tote until she found her phone, but that wasn't the number she dialed.

"Raydor," a crisp voice answered on the third ring.

"Hey, you still at work?"

A sigh. "Yeah. What's up? Did Kitty II escape again? You need baby gates, Brenda."

"No, no. I just got an invitation. To a birthday party. Tomorrow," she elaborated.

There was a pause. "Oh. Oh, yes, right."

"It's not too late for me to RSVP, is it?"

"What? No, of course not. Ridiculously pretentious invitations aside, it's a kids' party. Ice cream, cake, balloons."

"Oh, good." Brenda grinned and looked down at the cat, who was busily scarfing down her food. "Why didn't you mention it? You didn't have to go to the trouble of sendin' me an invitation."

"I didn't invite you."

It was Brenda's turn to pause. "Oh."

"I didn't mean it that way, although it will be mostly family. Hang on." There was a scraping sound, as if Sharon had muffled the receiver, and Brenda heard her say, "Thank you, Kate. Drop it in my in-box and get out of here; it's Friday night."

"Should I not go?" Brenda asked awkwardly, at a loss. "Would it make you uncomfortable?"

"No, of course not. Why on earth would it? Just don't expect the social event of the season," the captain cautioned.

"I bet it will be," Brenda shot back. "What did you mean, you didn't invite me?"

"Oh." Sharon chuckled. "Helen called the other day and asked if I knew anyone named Brynna, or if Daniel did. You're famous."

Brenda blushed, absurdly pleased to know that she was memorable enough to have survived a toddler's goldfish memory. "She really asked for me? Personally? I'm honored."

The captain chuckled, and Brenda could hear the other woman smiling. "As well you should be. You made quite the impression on her."

"I'm excited to see her again," Brenda admitted, wondering if she'd have time to run out to the store to buy some sort of suitable gift for a two-year-old. "Now, stop me if I'm wrong here, but you don't sound all that thrilled about this."

The squeak of a chair let Brenda know that the captain had leaned back, perhaps after setting down her glasses and pinching the bridge of her nose. "I'm not."

"'Cause your ex is the one throwin' the party?"

"It's not that. We get along fine. It's the whole thing: the family gathered together under one roof, all of us pointedly ignoring the glaringly obvious absence..." Her voice trailed off, broken momentarily by a sigh. "It'll be a circus. Tensions will be running high...and you know what? Clarissa doesn't need all of that. She doesn't like crowds. She'd be perfectly content just having a tea party with _The Last Unicorn_ playing in the background."

Brenda was overcome by the overwhelming urge to reach across the phone line and squeeze the captain's hand, and instead scratched behind the cat's ears. She felt stupid for not having realized it before: it was Sharon's granddaughter's birthday, and her daughter wouldn't be there to mark the occasion. Was the party meant to be some sort of consolation to make up for Vivien's absence? From the less-than-enthused tone of Sharon's voice, it sounded like it was meant to be more of a show for the adults than a celebration of the child's birthday.

"Well, I'll be there," the blonde added, as if it were some grand consolation. "You won't have to deal with any of that on your own."

The captain snorted derisively. "I'd rather not deal with it at all, but alas, the show must go on. And a show it will be. I should warn you about what you're getting yourself into..."

"Are the Tates a pack of barracudas or somethin'?"

Sharon chuckled. "Not quite."

"Don't you worry. I can handle myself. Besides, I'm very curious to see this ex-husband of yours."

"Why? Are you going to interrogate him, learn all of my deep, dark secrets?"

"I wanna see the man who was crazy enough to let you go." There was a pause and Brenda decided to change the subject before Sharon could respond or, worse, pick up on the fact that this was an issue that Brenda couldn't let go. "So what should I bring? I'll have to run back out and get her a present...and I suppose I'll have to make it a good one since I'm her special guest."

"Just don't show up with a pony."

"No... I wouldn't want to get her the same thing you did." Sharon laughed and the sound of it made Brenda smile. "Should I meet you there tomorrow?"

"I'll pick you up in the morning."

"I'm really lookin' forward to it."

Sharon hesitated for a moment. "Yes. Well, I should finish up here. I'll see you tomorrow."

Before Brenda could say goodbye, the call was disconnected. She dropped her phone back in her purse and scooped up the cat that was rubbing its little head against her calf. "How was dinner, sugar? Yummy, huh?" The cat purred, tilting her head while Brenda scratched her neck. "Don't you worry about Auntie Sharon. I'll make sure she has a good time at this party."

"There you are. Hiding?"

"Not at all, just taking a little break. I figured Cee had enough doting admirers without me, for once."

"But you're Grandpa Paul," Sharon teased lightly, sitting down in one of the cedar gliders on Paul and Helen's chic patio with the birthday girl in her lap. The little girl clutched a fistful of shiny gold wrapping paper to her chest and burrowed into her grandmother's arms. "You're indispensable."

Sharon and her ex-husband sat quietly, watching the action further down on the sloping lawn. There was Helen's niece with her son, a sturdy little boy of four who was busily playing with Clarissa's new toys; Daniel, chatting politely with Helen while he ate more than his fair share of birthday cake; and, of course, Brenda, making time with one of the other partners at Paul's firm.

"I think she had a good time," Paul murmured, reaching over to stroke his sleepy granddaughter's curls.

Sharon nodded and murmured an affirmative.

"Thanks for being a good sport, Shar."

"For a good cause. And thank you for, ah -"

"Not letting Helen get completely carried away? She means well, but I didn't want this day turned into a three-ring-circus any more than you did. It's hard enough as it is."

Rather than answering, Sharon just looked down at the child on her lap. "Two years old," she said. "You're getting to be such a big girl."

"She looks just like Vivvy."

"Yes." The captain stroked one soft, rosy cheek. "Can we not do this today?"

Paul shrugged. "There's not really a good time, is there?"

There wasn't, of course. Sharon allowed her eyes to drift closed for a few seconds. "What was her favorite present, would you say?"

Her ex-husband chuckled. "There's no contest, is there? She's holding it."

Sharon grinned. Like most two-year-olds, Clarissa was vastly more interested in the wrapping paper and boxes than in their contents, and the gold paper that had encased a little stuffed kitty given to her by her very special guest was a run-away hit. As if on cue, the toddler shifted, and the paper crinkled. "My little magpie." Sharon looked back to Paul. "She's exhausted. I'll put her down."

He stood as well. "Do you mind if I come too?"

Sharon blinked, surprised. "No, of course not. I'm sure she'd love to have Grandpa read _The Three Little Kittens_."

"Read it? I can recite it."

And recite it he did, although Clarissa was sound asleep long before he reached the last words. The pair stood looking down at her, at her peaceful, sturdy little body and the black eyelashes so long they drew shadows on her cheeks. The moment gave Sharon an oddly comforting sense of deja vu, only there was one baby rather than two, and both she and Paul were a lot older and, perhaps, a little wiser.

"I like Brenda," he said suddenly. "I'll admit I had some doubts when I realized she was _the_ deputy chief who was Gavin's client. I didn't know the two of you were friends."

"We weren't," Sharon replied simply.

"Is that why you didn't tell her Gavin was a partner in my firm?" he asked, genuinely curious and tacking on a follow-up in true lawyer fashion.

The captain shrugged. "Part of the reason," she admitted. "She was reluctant enough to hire an attorney. I didn't want her antipathy toward me to color her judgment of the best the city has to offer."

"The second best."

Sharon smirked. "I was hardly going to suggest she hire _you_, Paul. Besides, she couldn't afford you."

"True enough," he replied easily. "But I'm glad she came. God knows she and Gavin have been the life of the party today."

"Let's be honest: the rest of us set the bar pretty low." Sharon tenderly smoothed a light blanket over Cee's belly, and then couldn't hold back a sigh. "Especially Daniel."

A melancholy, contemplative silence stretched between them. "What are we going to do about him, Sharon?"

"He's handling it the best he can."

"By not handling it at all? Who does that sound like?"

"That isn't fair."

"None of this is fair. I never know from day to day when I talk to him if he's going to act like everything's perfectly fine, or if he's going to be weeping and wailing."

"If you're suggesting our son is overly emotional, like some sort of homosexual stereotype -" she clipped out.

"Jesus, Sharon. Come on." Paul ran his hand through his salt and pepper hair, a gesture still as familiar to Sharon as was her own reflection in the mirror. "What I'm suggesting is that if his mother didn't encourage him -"

"I don't," she interrupted. "I don't, Paul."

"Okay. Okay, I know." Her ex-husband sounded fatigued and resigned. He and the mother of his children had been apart as long as they'd been together, and the memory of the bitterness that had grown up between them was as distant as the memory of the first throes of passionate infatuation. Habitually now they spoke to one another in tones of an odd sort of mutually irritable affection. "But we've got to make him see that our girl isn't coming back, that it isn't going to happen. Christ, Sherry, every time he looks at me with those eyes full of hope, it rips me apart all over again, like it's that first day -"

She looked down at her joined hands, twisting them together. It was Paul who had given her the news, looming suddenly in the doorway of her office and simply saying "Sherry" in a desiccated, papery voice that had instantly terrified her. Helen had been the one to answer the door to the crisply uniformed young men, Vivien's little daughter perched on her hip. She was clutching the baby when Paul and Sharon had arrived. Paul had sat on the piano bench with his head in his hands. Sharon had gripped a richly embroidered throw pillow until she lost all feeling in her whitened fingers, and then she had excused herself and fumbled around in Paul and Helen's sunny kitchen until she found what she needed to make green jasmine tea that no one would drink because she had a vague notion that it was what her own mother might have done under the circumstances.

Clarissa had slept peacefully on, oblivious to the tableau of silent agony.

Daniel had been in class. As with Clarissa, his parents had left him undisturbed as long as possible, but somehow he had known. Sharon's phone had rung and his strained voice had asked, "Mom, what's going on? What's wrong?"

Sharon realized she had a thin sliver of a hangnail on her left pinky. "I've always been the bad cop," she said, and before Paul could say anything else she added, "I'll talk to him." Automatically she glanced out the window and caught just a flash of coral: Brenda's dress. "Please say goodbye to Helen for me. I'll find Brenda and go."

The blonde stood just beyond the porch in a patch of clear, warm sunshine, her head tilted back to absorb as many of the rays as possible. The leaves of the oak tree above cast dancing shadows on her closed eyelids and sharp little nose. She looked so peaceful that Sharon stopped short, quietly drawing the door closed behind her with a minimal snick.

Brenda's eyes opened anyway, and she smiled when she saw Sharon on the porch - so very much Sharon today in her blue dress and cheerful mustard-yellow cardigan, miles away from Captain Raydor. "Hey there," she greeted the brunette. "How's the birthday girl?"

"Fast asleep."

Sharon thought her voice sounded perfectly normal, but Brenda's brow wrinkled with her frown. "Is anythin' wrong?"

"No. I was just talking to Paul." She smoothed her hands over her hips and tripped lightly down the porch steps. "Are you ready to go?"

"Sure." The chief cocked her head and studied her friend - her best friend. "Are you sure nothin's wrong?"

"We were discussing Daniel, that's all."

"It's nice that the two of you get along so well."

Sharon hummed, abstracted.

"And Helen seems nice."

"Sometimes I think she forgets that Clarissa isn't actually her baby, but yes," Sharon agreed wryly, unlocking the car.

"Oh, please. That child's a Raydor if ever I saw one."

"And you're an expert, are you?" But Sharon grinned with satisfaction as she backed down the sweeping driveway.

Brenda curled up, contented as a pussycat, in the passenger seat, resting her head against the window. She yawned. "I can't _believe_ you never told me your ex-husband is the chief partner in Gavin's firm."

Sharon smirked. "It never came up."

"Uh-huh. Kinda makes me wonder what else has _never come up_, Captain." She gazed suspiciously at the other woman, and then let her eyes close. "I don't know about you," she murmured, "but I'm crashing from all the empty carbs in that cake and those potato chips. I don't suppose you'd be interested in gettin' some real food?"

Sharon squinted over at her passenger before dropping her sunglasses into place. "Such as?"

Brenda Leigh cracked one dark eye open a fraction. "Pizza?" she asked hopefully.

Sharon threw back her head and laughed, wind whipping in from the partially open window and tossing her hair around her face. The younger woman was incorrigible, in some ways just a big kid herself. "You're on," the captain agreed. "My place or yours?"

"Yours," Brenda decreed, and let her eyes close again, happy to nap while the other woman negotiated the Saturday afternoon traffic.

They stopped at a nearby pizza place, Brenda's favorite in Sharon's neighborhood. The blonde ordered and paid for their supper, choosing the other woman's favorite toppings in the hope that it would help sway her into a lightened mood. Though Sharon insisted that she was fine, there was something heavy about her, something that darkened her eyes and clung about her like a raincloud. Brenda instinctively wanted to shield her from the full brunt of the melancholic mood that was threatening to overtake her and was glad, at least, that Sharon hadn't simply dropped her off at home to stew in silence.

Both women were lethargic when they reached Sharon's front door, and Brenda jovially regaled Sharon with anecdotes about Clarissa's interest in her hair and her excellent taste in wrapping paper, things that the older woman clearly must have missed out on when she was hob-nobbing with the other adults.

Sharon issued a little sigh of relief when she was able to turn on the lights in her house, and Brenda knew how pleased she was to be home. She couldn't blame her, recalling with shuddering clarity just how tiresome and tense her own family gatherings could be. She headed for the kitchen, anxious to set down the steaming pizza.

"Here kitty! Your mama's home!" Brenda called out, looking around for a sign of the complacent gray cat.

"Unlike your cat, mine has a name," Sharon replied. They entered the kitchen and while Brenda placed the pizza on the counter, Sharon shook a bag of cat treats. The one-eyed cat strutted lazily into the room, her limp barely noticeable, pausing midway to lick her paw.

"What's her name again? Marzipan?"

Sharon rolled her eyes and set a treat on the floor. "Manzana."

"_Manzana,"_ Brenda repeated, her Southern twang squeezing out an extra syllable. "I don't know how you came up with that, but it seems oddly appropriate."

"Does it?" Sharon put the cat treats away rather than leave them out on the counter like Brenda did and busied herself with pouring them each a glass of wine.

"Of course. She's the apple of your eye now, isn't she?" Brenda eyes twinkled and she leaned down to stroke the cat's fur, amazed at the change in the feline. Out of the shelter it thrived, clearly proving just what a good home and a loving owner could provide to an animal in need. She hoped that she'd been able to give the same to her own cat, though she knew that her kitten hadn't come from such difficult circumstances like Sharon's. "Aren't you just the prettiest thing?"

"I am pretty fond of her," Sharon agreed with a nod, regaining the same faraway expression. "She's a good cat." She took a long sip of her wine, staring off toward the window, and Brenda knew that she was a million miles away.

"Wanna eat?" Brenda asked brightly. She opened the pizza box, proudly displaying her pizza topping skills, watching Sharon's face carefully for a reaction.

When it came, it wasn't the one she'd expected. Sharon stared at their dinner, the color slowly draining from her face only to rush back to her cheeks. "Pepperoni, mushrooms, and green peppers," she said faintly.

"And onion," Brenda added conscientiously.

"And onion," the other woman echoed. As Brenda watched her entire body seemed to tighten, drawing into a tense bow that would require years of yoga to unbend. She gripped the edge of the counter.

"Should I get plates?"

Sharon didn't answer. Instinctively Brenda Leigh took a step back, giving her space but not too much space. The silence elongated, growing thin. Brenda gnawed away on her lower lip.

The taller woman's shoulders heaved once, and then were still again. Brenda waited, barely breathing, as if waiting for a storm to break, the kind with heat lightning and lashing rains that the Georgia skies suddenly, spectacularly unfurled in July and August.

Sharon's shoulders began to shake. From her vantage point, all Brenda could see was long dark hair and sharp shoulder blades jutting against the cardigan. The captain remained completely silent, frighteningly controlled.

"Sharon?" the blonde finally asked softly, her voice a whispered thread.

"I feel like an idiot, standing here crying over a pizza." Frustrated, Sharon rested her palms on the edge of the counter and pushed herself back. She sniffled and unthinkingly swiped at her nose with the sleeve of her cardigan. Somehow it was that very un-Sharon gesture that finished breaking Brenda's heart.

"It's all right," she said, drifting toward Sharon but stopping a few feet short, unsure of whether touching her would be an invasion.

Sharon met her eyes with a tiny, miserable smile. "No," she said thickly, "it isn't."

"No, I know." Brenda settled for placing her hand near the other woman's on the counter, heartbroken and ashamed of her pitiful inadequacy and desperate to help. "But it's okay to cry, Sharon."

The captain's eyes glittered with a combination of unshed tears and rage. "Hate to cry," she muttered, clearly infuriated.

"Me too," Brenda agreed, unsurprised. "But maybe you need to."

"Paul thinks I'm refusing to deal with what happened to Vivien, and that it's bad for Daniel. Is that what you mean?"

Brenda blinked. "No, Sharon. I think you're dealin' with it in your way. But I do think maybe you need someone to tell you it's okay to be sad."

Sharon swallowed hard, still staring at the pizza. "This was her favorite. It was exactly the combination she always wanted from the time she was nine. She and Daniel used to fight because he always wanted to add pineapple."

Brenda Leigh scrunched her nose up. "I'm with Vivien."

"I was too." Sharon attempted a faint smile. "You think the big things, the special occasions - Christmas, birthdays - will be the worst, but they're not. It's the little things you can't anticipate that blindside you, like goddamn pizza toppings. And today... Cee was so happy. She's such a happy, buoyant child, and that's wonderful, but I can't help thinking that not only will she never know her mother, but she'll never even know what she's missed."

"Maybe not. I mean, you don't know for sure that Vivien's -"

Brenda broke off, arrested by the fierce, stricken expression on Sharon's bloodless face.

"I know," the older woman said. "I know, Brenda. Paul knows. Our baby girl is dead."

"_How_ do you know?" Brenda almost whispered, awed.

It should've been exactly the wrong thing to say, but the question seemed to make Sharon come back to herself. "I just... I just know, Brenda. I feel it in my bones."

Brenda waited silently, trying to fathom what it was like for Sharon to harbor that quiet, grim certainty amid so much doubt. There was no body, no coffin, no funeral service; just a mother standing in her kitchen and saying "I know."

"I'm not especially religious, but sometimes I pray they'll find her body. For Daniel most of all. Just for that."

Brenda blinked furiously to clear her own vision. Now was not the time for her to break down.

Sharon closed the pizza box, turned away, and disappeared down the darkened hallway. Brenda thought she'd probably gone into her bedroom.

The blonde stood in the kitchen, paralyzed by indecision. Should she go? She felt like an intruder, a voyeur; but she didn't want to leave Sharon alone like this.

Her stomach rumbled and she blushed, foolishly embarrassed. She was still hungry, but didn't dare eat the pizza. She nibbled thoughtfully at the corner of her thumbnail for a moment, and then began to move quietly around the kitchen, making herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

When Brenda had eaten her sandwich and drunk a glass of milk and watched the sun set completely and spent ten minutes trying to figure out how to get the kitchen faucet to stop dripping, and Sharon still hadn't made a peep, the blonde quietly, hesitantly went in search of her. She moved cautiously, warier than she usually was when she searched an unfamiliar building for an armed suspect. Her CIA training stood her in good stead: not so much as a floorboard creaked under her weight.

Sharon lay on the bed on her side, her back to the doorway and her knees drawn to her chest, perfectly still save the rhythmic rise and fall of her chest and shoulders in time with her breathing. Instinctively Brenda held her own breath, loathe to disturb a private moment, but Sharon sensed her presence.

"Brenda?" That low voice was thick and rough.

"Hey." She leaned in the doorway, unsure whether or not she should advance.

"I wasn't sure you were still here."

"D'you want me to go?"

"No." Sharon rolled to face her, dark hair slipping over her shoulder, and the younger woman saw that her cheeks were still wet from the tracks of her tears but her expression was more composed. "I'm glad you stayed."

Hearing the words made Brenda feel instantly relieved and she gave a soft smile. "I wasn't about to leave you alone," she explained, making her way into the bedroom. She paused at the nightstand, pulling out a few kleenex from the box, and crawled onto the bed. She stretched out on the empty side of the bed (her own side, she noted to herself) and, settling her head against the pillow, she handed Sharon a tissue.

Sharon dabbed at her eyes and flicked her tongue against her lip. "You must think I'm neurotic."

"For havin' feelings? I think you're a mother who misses her baby girl. I don't think less of you for breakin' down." Brenda tentatively reached out and pushed back Sharon's hair, leaving her pale face uncovered.

"I do."

The blonde laughed incredulously. "I _know_ you do. You're too hard on yourself. You get mad at yourself for bein' emotional and mad at yourself for bein' distant. You try so damn hard to find the middle ground that you just miss it altogether." When the older woman's red-rimmed eyes narrowed, Brenda immediately back-pedaled. "I just mean that when you hold it in all the time, it's gonna come rushin' out all at once."

"Daniel wants me to let it out. I think on some level he needs to see me break down, like my grief isn't real unless I express it the way he does. He's so in touch with his feelings...it's that damn psychoanalytical way of thinking that he has. If I don't cry, I don't care...at least not as much as he does."

"Oh Sharon...but you do care! Surely he knows that?"

Sharon sniffed, wiping her nose with the crumpled tissue she clutched in her hand. "I think he does. He's just so fragile. I can't imagine how hard this is for him...the connection he had with her...I don't know what I'd do if-" She cut herself off, blinking back a new wave of fresh tears. "I know how strong the bond between twins is." She looked up at the headboard, hoping to keep herself from crying, and finally rolled onto her back. "When they were young, they always knew when something was wrong. Danny broke his arm falling out of the tree house and Vivien ran all the way home from practice because she just _knew_. They've always been like that. They had their own special world that they lived in."

"It sounds beautiful," Brenda said quietly, giving her friend a chance to work through the thick current of emotion that had risen in her throat.

"You know he was sick when her plane went down?" Sharon asked, turning her head toward Brenda.

"Was he?"

"Horrible stomach pains. He thought it was a hangover; it was a few days before we were notified and he was so angry that he brushed it off...that he didn't _listen_." Sharon choked out a strangled sob. "As if he could've done something halfway across the world when she was dying."

Brenda couldn't help it; a stray tear rolled down her cheek.

"He won't believe it now. He thinks she's all right, that he just can't sense her. He can't accept what happened to her." She covered her face with both of her hands and began to cry in earnest, her body shuddering under the weight of her own misery.

Brenda scooted closer and draped an arm across Sharon's stomach, clutching her tightly as she rested her chin on Sharon's shoulder. "It's okay," she lied, rubbing Sharon's side. "It's gonna be okay."

She held Sharon until her tears began to subside. When the tension drained from her shoulders, Brenda carefully removed Sharon's hands from her face, resting them on her stomach, and then began to wipe away the wet traces of sorrow that marred the other woman's face with the spare tissue. Sharon lay still, allowing herself to be cleansed, watching the blonde's face as it concentrated on her task.

"There now," Brenda soothingly cooed. "Doesn't it feel better to let go a little?"

"It feels like hell," Sharon croaked, her voice raw and husky.

"I know...but it'll get better. I know it doesn't feel like it right now, but it hasn't been that long. We all deal with our grief in different ways and Daniel's handlin' it the only way he knows how. If he needs help, Sharon, you'll _know_. He's your baby."

Sharon nodded solemnly, worrying her lip between her teeth.

"And Clarissa," Brenda continued, motivated now to speak the words that filled her heart with whatever glimmer of hope she could cling to, "she may not know her mama the way a child should, but she _will_ know her. She'll get to know her through you and Danny and Paul, and she'll know her mama died a hero serving her country. She'll know how much her family loves her and how much her mama loved her. She'll be proud of her. She's gonna grow up so damn thankful to have Vivien Raydor Tate as her mama."

Sharon bit her lip hard, tasting the metallic tang of blood on her tongue. She looked at Brenda in the darkness of her room, at her heartfelt expression, and felt the painful knot in her stomach begin to ease its grip. There was no way that Brenda could know what it felt like to carry the burden of her loss, of her guilt, the way that Sharon did. She'd kept it close to her for so long that it had become a part of her, something she had learned to integrate into her very being. Somehow, in a way that no one else had, Brenda had seen through it, had seen Sharon at her very core. Brenda Leigh Johnson, a woman she once despised, had somehow been able to say exactly what Sharon needed to hear-and not only did Brenda say it, she actually believed it.

The captain rolled onto her side, unsurprised when the blonde didn't pull away. Brenda simply rested her hand along the curve of her waist, still gripping the sodden tissue. Sharon could see the tracks of Brenda's own tears and felt something twist in her gut to know that Brenda had willingly shared in her pain, had taken some of it for her own so Sharon wouldn't continue to buckle under the weight. She'd never allowed anyone else to do that for her. She'd never _wanted_ to.

What was it about Brenda Leigh that was different from everyone else? What was it about this maddening, intelligent, beautiful woman that put her at ease and made her feel like her self-imposed solitude wasn't what she really needed?

There was so much that Sharon wanted to say to her. The words were thick and ready on her tongue, but she knew the way she knew that her baby girl had died that there were no words to convey just what Sharon was feeling in that moment.

Instead, Sharon tossed aside her platitudes and her excuses and her fears and simply kissed her. Eyes open, the brunette pressed her lips against Brenda's, tasting confusion and hesitance. The hand on her hip clutched at her in shock, the feel of those bruising fingers making Sharon feel alight with something she hadn't felt in so long. Chocolate eyes widened momentarily before Brenda finally relaxed, pursed her lips, and kissed her back.

Sharon's heart hammered painfully in her chest, blood roaring in her ears. As soon as she blinked it was over. She pulled away and licked her lips, her face flushing hotly. It was a soft kiss, a sweet kiss; it communicated so much more than the gratitude Sharon had felt and yet, it expressed more than Sharon could even begin to comprehend.

She blinked slowly. Brenda was staring at her, eyes impossibly wide. The younger woman waited for any hint of a reaction, eagerly watching to read Sharon's features like the pages of a book. That knowledge calmed the captain; it gave her back a measure of control.

Sharon felt the skin around her eyes relax as she lay back, one hand finding Brenda's and squeezing. "Thank you." She felt soft palm and damp tissue and wrinkled her nose slightly.

Brenda smiled, her eyes very bright, and fisted her hand around the soggy Kleenex. "You're welcome," she said simply. "Any time."

_Any time_, Sharon mentally echoed. I'll hold your snotty tissues any time, or you can kiss me any time? She was too tired and too shell-shocked to wonder. She heard herself chuckle rustily, and Brenda looked taken aback, but then blinked a couple of times, quickly, and smiled again. Sharon wasn't sure what Brenda Leigh meant, and wasn't sure what she herself had meant - only that she had meant, that it had been meaningful, and that she was so glad the other woman was there.

The older woman reached out and patted the younger woman's upper arm, and it was a little too firm, a little awkward and stilted. Brenda patted back, equally clumsy.

"Would you like some tea?"

Sharon closed her eyes and breathed out in a whoosh. "That sounds wonderful."

"You just stay there. I'll be right back." The mattress shifted as the blonde got to her feet, and if she was a little over eager to get out of the bedroom, Sharon couldn't blame her.

The floor was cool beneath her bare feet as Brenda padded through Sharon's house toward the kitchen. She started when Manzana leaped from the darkness, landing a few feet behind her with a soft thud and a feline trill. She automatically reached down to pet the cat, who looked up at her with that single crystal blue eye that she felt sure was inquisitive. "It's okay," Brenda assured in a low croon. "Your mama's okay, kitty cat."

With the cat at her heels, Brenda set about making the tea, busying herself with all the little steps of the mundane task and keeping up a constant stream of quiet, nervous chatter, ostensibly for the cat's benefit. She rummaged in the cupboard, pulling down two yellow mugs, and selected loose-leaf ooh-long. She breathed deeply, allowing the earthy scent to fill her lungs, soothing her.

Her heart was beating too quickly, her chest tight. The tea would soothe Sharon too, she reassured herself.

When the tea had brewed, Brenda carefully carried the mugs back down the hall, Sharon's feline protector now leading the way rather than following.

The dark-haired woman had crawled under the comforter and lay still, fast asleep. Like Clarissa's, her long, dark eyelashes cast shadows on her cheeks. The mustard hue of her cardigan showed brightly against the pale green sheets.

As quietly as she could, Brenda put one of the mugs down on the night stand and stood sipping from the remaining one, one ankle awkwardly tucked behind the other. She studied her friend intently, and then looked away, examining the walls and windows, when she again felt like a voyeur.

Manzana had no such qualms. She jumped onto the bed, seemingly not hampered at all by her weak leg, and curled herself into a ball at Sharon's hip. The captain stirred, a hand reaching out from beneath the covers and absently stroking the cat's head. "Oh, the tea," she murmured, her voice thick with sleep. She pushed herself up against the pillows and shoved her hair back, and then lifted the mug. Her bleary eyes settled on Brenda.

"Come sit with me," she invited quietly, patting the spot beside her on the bed. Her features were soft and open, and she looked surprisingly young - young and vulnerable. Brenda immediately propped herself against the headboard, stretching her legs out and offering Sharon a small smile. She was careful not to touch her friend, but remained vitally aware of her warmth, the soft slurping of her lips against the edge of the mug as she drank the hot liquid, the most minute shifting of her legs under the comforter.

Brenda was just in time to grab Sharon's mug from her nerveless fingers and prevent it from spilling all over the fine brocade comforter. Stretching as far as she possibly could, she just managed to twist the switch on the bedside lamp, plunging the room into darkness. She eased very carefully back against the headboard, careful not to jar the bed's other human occupant. If she got up she might wake Sharon, and she wanted to let her sleep. She'd wait there just a little while, just until she was sure the other woman was deeply asleep, before she went home.

Brenda shifted slightly and reached to stroke Manzana's sleek gray fur. The cat rumbled out a purr, low and constant, communicating the contentment that the deputy chief seemed to feel rolling over her own body.

It was pitch black when Sharon awoke, and she felt the fuzzy twist of disorientation that always assaulted her when she fell asleep in her clothes or somewhere other than her own bed. This was her bed, though, the mattress solid but forgiving; and there was no compelling reason to get up and change her clothes. Stretching experimentally, she became aware of a warm, solid ball at the base of her spine, and her lips curved as she reached to stroke her cat's soft fur. The apple of her eye, Brenda Leigh had said. Well, maybe so. Manzana knew how to take a lickin' and keep on tickin'. And so did her human mama. The captain recognized a kindred spirit when she met one.

Sharon was startled for only a split second when her fingers made contact with both soft fur and warm, smooth skin. Brenda. Her eyes had begun to adjust slightly to the darkness, and when the captain gingerly rolled over, she could make out the vague contours of coral cotton against the fabric of the comforter. She had stayed. Of course she had stayed.

Sharon knew she should wake her. The younger woman would be far more comfortable in her own bed, or at the very least in Sharon's guest room, rather than sprawled here atop the covers, her head lolling at a rather awkward angle.

The dark-haired woman considered, her sleepy thoughts turning over sluggishly. Manzana was pretty good company - but Brenda was better. Also, it was two a.m. Surely a compromise was in order.

Slipping soundlessly from the bed, Sharon crossed the room and lifted a soft throw from the back of the armchair that stood in the window nook. Returning, she gently tucked it around the sleeping woman. Manzana's eye glowed an unearthly shade as she fixed it upon her mistress. Sharon gave the feline a final pat and slid back under the thick, fluffy comforter. The last thing she heard before sleep again overtook her was the cat's low, contented purr.


	14. Chapter 14

**Title: Since You Went Away**

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 8267**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: A thousand thanks for all your support and lovely comments. Things are beginning to get interesting, in our humble opinion. If you're of the hat-wearing persuasion, we strongly suggest you hold onto those chapeaux...**

**Chapter 14: The Philadelphia Story**

When a certain blonde deputy chief strode into the crowded IA bullpen, the smattering of officers at their desks stopped what they'd been doing and stared so avidly that Brenda Leigh automatically looked down to see whether her skirt was tucked up into her pantyhose. It wasn't.

"Chief Johnson," said a woman with iron gray hair and a smoker's throaty tenor, her tone heavy with trepidation, "how can we help you today?"

"Oh, I just came to see Capt'n Raydor." Brenda smiled, trying her best to make it clear that she was playing nicely.

"Oh." The woman looked unabashedly relieved. "She just stepped out. I'm surprised you didn't pass her in the hall."

"She's gone to a scene?" the chief asked, always curious.

The woman looked back at her computer screen. "Ah, no," she said distractedly. "Visitor. You can probably catch her."

Brenda nodded and turned on one heel, already rushing toward the elevator. Sharon had a visitor? She imagined Paul, Daniel, maybe even Helen (a cultured blonde who, in the chief's opinion, couldn't hold a candle to the brunette captain) - None of them would be dropping by on a social call in the middle of a work-day. She jabbed fretfully at the elevator call button. What if something was wrong? What if there had been an accident or Clarissa was sick or - Oh, God, what if it was about Vivien? How would Sharon be able to cope with that, coming on the heels of the tumultuous past weekend?

The elevator hovered on the ninth floor. Impatient, Brenda trotted toward the stairs.

She was a little dizzy when she emerged into the lobby five floors down and peered intently at the front desk. Two sergeants chatted with the receptionist, obviously vying for her attention; a delivery man was arriving with a towering tray of deli sandwiches; a middle-aged man standing near a potted palm checked his watch. There was no sign of Sharon.

The elevator doors slid open with a ding and a whoosh, revealing a very familiar black-suited form. All the way across the lobby Brenda saw the way green eyes lit up, and for a split second she thought her friend had seen her. Then Sharon called out "Richard!" in a bright, clear tone that bounced off the glass ceiling of the atrium. In four long strides she was hurling herself into the arms of the middle-aged watch-checker, narrowly avoiding taking out the potted palm.

Brenda Leigh gawked. From here she had a clear view of the other woman's face, and she'd never seen that expression on it before, not with Daniel or Clarissa or even little Manzana. Sharon was incandescent with joy, her eyes alight and her mouth curved into a huge, very un-Captain-Raydor smile; and then her face was hidden as she burrowed into the man's neck, careless of any damage she might do to what looked like a very expensive dress shirt, and pressed her whole body to his.

The man's - Richard's - low voice rumbled in greeting, and Brenda's alert ears picked out the word "sweetheart." Something unpleasantly hot coiled in her belly while her limbs tingled as if she'd been jolted with a taser.

Apparently nothing was wrong.

She set out across the lobby, skirting the oblivious captain and her "visitor." No way could she face those stairs going the other direction.

As the elevator doors slid closed she heard that smooth familiar alto ask "Brenda?" The deputy chief was only too glad to be safely enclosed, already gliding seamlessly upward. She pursed her lips and paced the elevator, a flood of emotion burning in her cheeks.

What the hell had that been about?

It had been years since Brenda had gone out of her way to avoid being seen by the captain-but perhaps, she admitted, she hadn't tried _that_ hard. She could have just as easily taken the stairs or, in a pinch, hidden in the ladies room until the cheery pair had vacated the lobby. Maybe, on some masochistic level driven by her subconscious, she had wanted to be seen.

_Hey Sharon, remember me? The woman you kissed_? Brenda attempted to stifle the little voice echoing in the back of her head but it persisted. A few days had passed since Clarissa's party-since _the kiss_. They hadn't spoken of it and had, like the adults they were, awkwardly avoided the topic, making up for the uncomfortable morning-after by gestures of exaggerated kindness and contrived excuses. Now, apparently, Sharon was getting chummy with some handsome guy, someone she'd never bothered to mention. Certainly someone who called you "sweetheart" was worth telling your best friend about?

Brenda moodily stomped her way back to her office, willfully ignoring Gabriel's attempt at calling her attention. She shut the door a little harder than she should have and slumped into her chair, pulling open her candy drawer. She had mercifully stocked up the day before and, while she silently thanked her instinct for its uncanny ability to foretell when she'd be in dire need of sugar, she pulled out a Twix. As she moved to close the drawer, she also snatched up a bag of M&M's.

So. Sharon Raydor had a gentleman caller, an effortlessly good-looking man with the temerity to show up during the work day to whisk the captain off her feet. The blonde tore open the M&M's with excessive force and the candies scattered across her desk, some tumbling onto the floor. "Shoot," she scowled, popping a blue candy into her mouth.

It occurred to her, as she arranged the M&M's by color on top of a crime scene photo of blood spatter, that there was absolutely no reason for Brenda to be so jealous. Who was she except a friend to the older woman?

Who, exactly, did she want to be?

Brenda popped a handful of orange candies into her mouth, the phone issuing a resounding chirp as she began to chew. A quick glance at the caller ID told her that it was Sharon.

"Yes?" Brenda asked coolly once she'd cradled the phone between her ear and shoulder, her nimble fingers tearing at the gold Twix wrapper.

"Call me crazy, but I could swear that I saw you in the lobby a few minutes ago," Sharon said, the tone of her voice carefree and pleasant, belying the accusation in her statement. "Why didn't you say hello?"

"I didn't want to interrupt," Brenda lied, instantly wishing that she had said she hadn't seen her.

"You should have. I could have introduced you to Richard! He flew in from Philadelphia this morning completely by surprise, can you believe it?"

"How 'bout that," Brenda drawled, biting into her chocolate-caramel snack. "Maybe next time."

"That's why I'm calling. I know we had plans tonight, but I hoped we could take a raincheck on the film. Why don't you join us for dinner instead?"

Brenda screwed her eyebrows together in confusion. Why on earth would Sharon invite her along as a third wheel on her date? Nostrils flaring, Brenda plastered on a fake smile that the other woman obviously couldn't see. "That's all right. You two have a good time without me."

"I _insist_, Brenda."

"Like I said...maybe next time. Listen, I've gotta go. Talk to you later." She hung up before the other woman could say another word.

It should have been satisfying to act like such a selfish snot, but Brenda felt worse than ever. Her chocolate, her decadent, feel-good, beloved treat, tasted like ash in her mouth. For a split second she thought about lifting the receiver from its cradle and calling back, making some lame excuse and accepting Sharon's invitation; and then she pictured the three of them sitting at dinner, somewhere with linen tablecloths and flickering candlelight, while Richard and Sharon played footsie under the table and Brenda prayed for someone important to die.

Hell, no. Sharon could insist all she wanted to; Brenda wasn't going.

The deputy chief gulped down the ashy Twix and grabbed for another handful of M&Ms, hoping for better results. Candy shells shattered and crunched between her molars, and she scowled vaguely at her screensaver. She tried to convince herself that she was mollified by the dinner invitation the captain had extended, even if it was insincere (it _had_ to be insincere, didn't it?); but it was hard not to feel slighted. Sharon was her best friend, and surely she was Sharon's too, and yet the other woman hadn't even mentioned that she had some jet-setting silver-fox lover squirrelled away somewhere. Brenda was beginning to think that Sharon was pathologically secretive.

For some reason, though, this stung in a way that finding out about Vivien and Clarissa hadn't. She thought they'd gotten past all this, that they'd formed an unusual sort of bond, shared something deeper than shopping for sofas and chatting over Chinese take-out. Splashing in the bathtub with Sharon's granddaughter, hearing the reassuring rise and fall of the other woman's breath as she slept beside her, wiping away the tears Sharon hadn't been ashamed to shed while Brenda looked on: these were acts that _meant_ something. They were... intimate.

That was it, Brenda admitted miserably to herself, moving on to a Reese's cup like a ravening horde of one. She'd begun to see herself as the one person who had access to those simple, intimate aspects of Sharon Raydor's life, and Brenda Leigh had never liked to share. As a child she'd been fiercely possessive of her toys, much to her mother's chagrin. Not, of course, that Sharon was a toy. No, she was something rarer and far more wonderful: a true friend. Brenda didn't want to share her.

The older woman had never looked at Brenda the way she'd looked at _Richard_. He probably knew all about Vivien's disappearance. Hell, he was probably Clarissa's godfather. Daniel probably called him Uncle Dick. And yet, where had he been Saturday night when Sharon had been sobbing her heart out? He hadn't been anywhere around, supplying tissues and ooh-long.

And kisses.

Not that the kiss was the issue. That had been a sweet, chaste exchange between friends, a wordless expression of gratitude and affection. It had nothing in common with the way Sharon would be kissing her mystery man later tonight, needy and passionate and urgent. Not that Brenda had any desire to think about that, and not that she was being assaulted by a barrage of images of the same.

Perhaps the real rub was that, even as Brenda was totally caught off guard by the man's appearance - by his very existence - her rational mind told her she shouldn't be. Sharon insisted she wasn't interested in dating anyone, and was cagey about her recent sexual history, both things that made perfect sense if she had some occasional, bi-coastal (because the man had "East Coast" written all over him) lover. The deputy chief thought of Sharon as she'd known her for the past three years, rather than Sharon as she'd known her for the last few months, and had to admit that such an arrangement seemed like it would suit the FID captain to a tee.

Brenda stared moodily at the candy wrappers littering the surface of her desk and wondered if she was the only person in the world not having sex.

Surely if Sharon was getting laid, Brenda could too.

Her mind resolutely made up, Brenda opened the middle drawer of the desk, rummaging around pens and stray business cards until she settled upon the one she was looking for. She sat back in her chair as she traced her thumb over the embossed name, a wicked smile playing across her lips.

When Brenda jammed her finger against the button that opened the main door to the apartment complex twenty minutes earlier than the agreed upon time, she vaguely paused to consider that the cards were already stacked against Dr. Jack C. Mendell. To be fair, they'd never actually been in his favor, but Brenda Leigh Johnson was too stubborn to admit when she'd made a foolishly impulsive decision.

She waited impatiently by the door for his arrival, wondering if it was too late to change her mind. Would a migraine be believable? Brenda quickly pushed that thought from her mind; the last time she'd pulled that excuse, she ended up with a blinding headache of skull-splitting proportions, her body psychosomatically punishing her for her lie. A sick kitten would certainly be believable, but could she trust that she wouldn't jinx the feline into vomiting all over the beautiful red sofa? Besides, as the cat spun around in circles in the middle of the room, chasing her own tail, Brenda knew that neither one of them would pass for being sick.

There was a knock. With a bracing sigh, the deputy chief plastered a jovial smile to her face and opened the door.

"Wow," said Jack, his blue eyes roving over her form, pausing for several seconds on her cleavage, "you look _spectacular_."

The blonde nearly rolled her eyes, biting back the desire to tell him that the rest of her looked just as good, if not better, than her breasts. "Thank you _so_ much. Come on in." She stood aside and allowed him to enter, already bristling at the overwhelmingly masculine presence in her living space. "I'm just about ready."

"Take your time," he added with a pearly white grin. "I'm a little early, I know. I was just so surprised that you called today that I didn't want to give you a chance to change your mind."

Brenda flushed. _Of course_ she would be that obvious to a psychologist. "You were that surprised?"

"When I gave you my card a few months ago, I never expected you to actually call." He chuckled, sitting down uninvited on the sofa. "I'm very glad you did." His sharp eyes darted over to the cat's acrobatic display on the carpet. "And who's this little guy?"

"This is Sugar." She had settled on the name last night when, at Sharon's insistence via text message, she was reminded that she'd have to provide the vet with a moniker when she finally took her for her shots.

"Hey there, little fella," Jack said, his charming smile directed at the white and gray animal.

"She's a girl. We're an all-girl household, aren't we, Sugar?"

The psychologist laughed. "I'm honored to have been invited into the clubhouse. I have two dogs myself, both males. Domino's a Dalmation and Butch is a Wiemaraner." He grinned proudly. "They're great. Guess you could say we've got ourselves a bachelor pad back home. I bet they'd love you."

Brenda had no idea what a wiemawhatchamacallit was, but found that she didn't care all that much to find out. "If you'll excuse me, I'll just finish up and then we can go." _And get this over with_, she thought. She swiftly ducked into her bedroom, closing the door behind her with a relieved sigh.

Deciding at the last minute to go on a date with a man she didn't know had not been one of her smartest ideas. She'd met Dr. Mendell on a case, where he had been a character witness for a man with Antisocial Personality Disorder who had set fire to a building, killing two people and seriously injuring one. The doctor had taken a liking to Brenda, despite her insistence that the nutjob be held responsible for his actions. He had managed to secure his patient long-term psychiatric treatment rather than prison time and Brenda had decided to lose his number.

Of all the men who had come on to her over the years, why had she chosen the one who had, for all intents and purposes, beaten her?

The answer was simple: Brenda was jealous and Jack was available. He was handsome enough with his dirty-blonde hair and his California tan; in her younger days, Brenda would surely have considered him a catch. Something had changed; the rugged masculinity and muscular physique did nothing for her anymore.

Out in his car, which was something imported and incredibly expensive and equally uncomfortable, Brenda gave herself what her daddy would have termed a strong talking-to. The point of this evening, she reminded herself, was to get to know someone new, someone she might be interested in spending time with. Jack Mendell was as likely a prospect as anyone else, and if she had no intention of giving him the benefit of the doubt, she might as well have stayed home. Then she'd be right back where she started, with all her eggs in one basket - Captain Sharon Raydor's basket.

"You'll love this restaurant," Jack promised, grinning over at her as he shifted gears, and Brenda forced herself to smile back enthusiastically. Then he lightly patted her knee through the sheer fabric of her dress, and Brenda stiffened. "They do great regional Thai food - northern Thai, which is hard to get around here. The authentic stuff, I mean."

Sharon had been to Thailand. There was a framed photo of her in her living room, tucked away in one corner of the large bookcase, showing the brunette against a background of rolling hills and lush green foliage. Brenda Leigh had imagined being there with her friend, standing upon that hilltop.

"I like Thai," Brenda replied, mildly encouraged.

The restaurant, which Jack had termed "a quiet neighborhood joint," turned out to be an upscale bistro. Brenda took in the teak tables and soft lights gleaming from burnished brass sconces, and again envisioned Sharon and Richard amid a sea of linen tablecloths and flickering candles. Blinking away the image, she smiled as Jack pulled her chair out for her. The smile turned into a wince as he pushed her a little too close to the table. Easing herself back, Brenda opened her menu, only to have it plucked from between her fingertips.

"You don't need that." Jack winked at her, his dark blue eyes twinkling. "I'll order for us. Trust me, I know what's good."

Internally, and perhaps externally, the deputy chief bristled. She didn't even know this man; how dare he presume he'd know what she wanted to eat?

_It's a new experience, _she insisted to herself. _Be open to new experiences._ _Sharon took you to that Cambodian sandwich place and convinced you to order the catfish, and you liked that._

So she sat quietly, smile pasted in place, while Dr. Jack reeled off an order to their black-shirted server, interrupting only when he added, "And tone the spice down a little, all right?"

Brenda's lips flattened into a line. "I like spicy," she cut in, and turned to the waiter. "I'll have mine however you usually prepare it, please."

The waiter nodded and smiled, and the skin around Jack's eyes tightened for just a second before it relaxed. "Okay, Brenda," he said slowly, his affable smile returning. "You like it hot. I'll remember that."

_You won't have the chance,_ she thought, and then reminded herself that she wasn't allowed to think that way, at least not until after their appetizer had been served.

The crunchy little baskets of minced chicken and corn were delicious; the conversation was not. Jack regaled her with tales of the time he'd spent backpacking around Southeast Asia as a twenty-something. The anecdotes themselves weren't at all objectionable, but there was something about his tone, the twinge of smugness it harbored, the way he laughed a little too loudly and long at his own jokes, that made Brenda long for her fuzzy pajamas and equally fuzzy kitty, and perhaps an extra large glass of Merlot.

Speaking of which - Brenda flagged their waiter down as he passed. "Red wine," she requested. "Merlot, malbec, whatever."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I should've asked if you wanted beer or wine with dinner." Jack wiped his lips a little too precisely with his napkin and smiled again. He had a fleck of green cucumber skin trapped between his bottom teeth. "I don't drink myself, but I don't mind if you do."

Brenda felt her mouth tighten, but she managed a small smile, and hoped the waiter returned very quickly with her wine.

Halfway through the main course she excused herself to the ladies' room. As she locked the door of the little cubicle behind her, she sighed with relief. Brenda had the urge to bash her head against the wall. What in the world was she doing here? This had been a terrible, terrible idea. Her date was a perfectly nice man, or at least she supposed he was, but he did absolutely nothing for her. Sugar, pajamas, her lovely red sofa: these things beckoned like never before, the siren call almost strong enough to make her call for a cab. Somewhere out there was some perfectly nice woman who would swoon over a perfectly nice man like Dr. Jack Mendell with his sports car and his macho dogs and his fondness for northern Thai cuisine. Brenda Leigh Johnson wasn't that woman.

Her fingernails sinking into the squares of toilet paper she held fisted in her hand, Brenda bowed her head over her splayed knees, her back slumping. Jack Mendell wasn't what, or who, she wanted tonight at all, and neither were any of the other men whose business cards lay discarded in her desk drawer. The truth was that the blonde wanted something - someone - entirely different.

Had she always been moving toward this moment, locked in a bathroom that smelled strongly of incense and disinfectant, realizing what had probably been obvious all along? Admittedly, Brenda was notorious for avoiding deep introspection and situations of a serious personal nature. It was easier that way; no one-well, mostly Brenda-ended up hurt when she refused to accept the perfectly unmistakable.

However, now that Brenda was faced with this inevitable conclusion, _she _was the one who would end up hurt, because Sharon was still the one who was off with a man who was probably perfectly nice and who clearly made her happy.

Brenda, on the other hand, was alone. Unless, of course, she counted Dr. Jack, which she did not. She rolled her eyes and accepted her fate: she could not simply click her heels three times and return home.

When Brenda arrived back at the table, she was stunned to see that her entree had been cleared away. "Where'd the food go?" she asked hesitantly, already dreading his answer.

"I assumed you were finished," Jack replied with a smile. "I ordered us dessert."

The blonde blinked at him and slowly reached for her wine. She remembered in that moment that her sidearm was tucked in its holster in her purse; certainly a psychologist knew how dangerous it was to mess with a woman's food? She took a large gulp. _The night was almost over...the night was almost over...the night was almost over..._

"I was thinking we could stop by this little art gallery nearby," he suggested, thanking the waiter when he set down one plate of an unrecognizable fruity concoction and two smaller dessert forks. "I know the artist-he's a minimalist. You'd _love _him. Give him six months and his work will be in the home of every actor this side of the Hollywood sign."

_This_ was dessert? Brenda wondered with horror, eyeing it with uncertainty as he stuck his fork into the corner of it, gathering up a bite-size of orangey goop. He held it up to her mouth and waited, his grin ever-present, until she gamely accepted the bite. It was sour and bitter and she puckered her mouth into an awkward smile as she quickly chewed, swallowed, and washed it down with another mouthful of Merlot.

"What do you say?" he prompted again, taking a bite for himself. He hummed in satisfaction and went back for another.

Brenda licked her lips. Sharon would never presume to know what she wanted without asking her. Sharon would never judge her for having a glass of wine with dinner or take her food away when she decided that Brenda was finished. Sharon would never make her feel like a pretty marionette to be controlled.

"I'd better not," the blonde said, forcing a hint of disappointment into her voice. "I've gotta feed Sugar. I'm still workin' on housebreakin' her, so I've gotta stick to a routine-y'know, feedin' her at the same time every night and all."

Brenda held her breath for the barest instant, waiting for his response. Surely an intelligent man would find it odd that she was so anxious about housebreaking a _cat_. But then, Dr. Jack was a dog man.

"Ah yes." Jack nodded knowingly, regaling her with tales of housebreaking his youngest dog, sparing no detail of soiled couch cushions and carpets while he inhaled the remainder of the dessert. It was just as well that it wasn't chocolate; she would have had to stab him with the fork to keep him from devouring it.

The drive back to Brenda's apartment complex was endless. She hated his car, hated the know-it-all tone of his voice, hated Richard, and hated that Jack wasn't Sharon.

He pulled up in front of the building and turned off the car, looking at her expectantly. "Shall I join you and make us some coffee while you feed the cat?"

Brenda gaped. She couldn't do this anymore. "Y'know what, Jack? I don't think that's a good idea." She unbuckled her seatbelt and collected her purse from the floor. "This was nice an' all, but I just realized I might have feelin's for someone else, and I think I'd like to see where that goes. Thanks for helpin' me realize that, Jack. You have a nice night now!"

Stretching limbs that had been awkwardly contorted in the low-slung seats of the sports car, Brenda reflected that this date hadn't been a total loss after all. It had turned out to be pretty therapeutic - appropriate, since Jack was a psychiatrist and all. And not only had Brenda not had to pay for it, but she'd gotten a free dinner into the bargain. Well, half a dinner, she mentally qualified, and then wondered if she was maybe a little hysterical.

She hovered in the lobby until she was sure Jack was out of sight, and then turned around and marched back the way she'd come, her heels ringing authoritatively on the pavement. The more she thought about Sharon and her mystery man, the angrier she became. Who did that designer-suit-wearing Yankee bitch of an FID captain think she was, anyway? You just didn't go around kissing people on the mouth and then letting other people call you "sweetheart." It was just _rude_, and Brenda was going to tell her so.

Brenda was so busy seething that her stomach didn't tie itself into a thousand knots until she'd already turned onto Sharon's street. What on earth was she doing here? For one thing, Sharon probably wasn't even back from dinner yet, and if she was, Richard would certainly be there with her. They might be doing... things. In fact, it was entirely likely that they _were_ doing things, if they only saw one another every few months.

The blonde felt all her features pucker into a scowl. Maybe Richard was a traveling salesman with a woman in every port. Or maybe he was married! She pictured a blurry wife and two-point-oh equally blurry children. Sharon obviously hadn't thought this through... Or maybe she had. Maybe she _knew_, the home-wrecking Jezebel.

It was this thought that gave Brenda Leigh the push she needed to turn into the driveway, parking behind an unfamiliar car that she immediately pegged as a rental, stalk up onto the porch, and jab the doorbell. She wasn't entirely sure if she was here to save Sharon from herself, to shake her until her perfect teeth rattled, or to hand her her ass. She'd make that decision when she actually saw her, _if_ she ever came to the door.

_She's probably gettin' dressed_, Brenda reminded herself, and scowled harder.

When she heard footsteps approach and the doorknob turn, Brenda automatically looked down, suddenly very afraid of what she might see, so her gaze fixated first on the bare feet that were revealed to her. Soft, white, bare feet with nails polished an indeterminate dark color that looked black in the dim glow from inside the house, and with a band-aid on one ankle. She couldn't have said why the sight of that band-aid suddenly made her feel like crying.

"Brenda?"

She looked up slowly, expecting bare skin or something thrown together in haste, and instead got chocolate-colored chinos, a wine-colored sweater, and a patterned silk scarf knotted and pinned at Sharon's throat. She got inquisitive green eyes gazing at her with a touch of wonder from behind the lenses of Sharon's glasses.

"Are you okay?"

The question, asked in Sharon's familiar tone of careful concern, alerted Brenda to the fact that she was gawking, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, like a zombie. _No_, she thought, and then realized she'd said it out loud as Sharon's eyes flared in alarm.

Confronted with the reality of this woman she considered her best friend, Brenda didn't shake her or scold her or say a single word. She did the only thing she could think of.

She kissed her.

The innocence of their first kiss could have been written off as something that happened between friends under highly emotional circumstances. The second kiss could not, if only because there _was_ a second kiss.

For a brief, stunned moment, illuminated by the warm glow of the interior of the house, Brenda Leigh could only think about one thing: she was kissing Sharon again. Her lips had slackened in shock and, when Brenda's fingertips ghosted against the line of Sharon's jaw, the other woman pursed her lips and kissed her back.

Like the first kiss, there was no time to marvel at how soft Sharon's lips were or how shockingly different it felt to kiss a woman. It was over seconds later when Sharon stepped back, her eyes narrowing in confused indignation. "What the hell was that all about?" she asked, the befuddled tone of her voice masking the accusation.

Brenda blinked. She had no idea what that had been about or why she had done it or why she was doing any of this. She was acting like a certifiably crazy person. She quickly scrambled for the reason why she'd been acting this way in the first place and glared right back. "Your boyfriend," she said, spitting out the word. "What're you doin' kissin' people when you've got a boyfriend?"

The captain gaped, her face flushing brightly. "Are you _insane_?"

Brenda merely stared at her. She had, after all, walked out on a perfectly nice head shrinker of her very own.

"Sis? Everything all right out here?" Richard asked, coming up behind Sharon. Matching green eyes gave Brenda a once-over, his hand resting on Sharon's shoulder.

The younger woman immediately felt as if she'd been doused in ice water. Brother? Richard was her _brother_? The resemblance was uncanny now that she had a chance to really look at him, from the shapes of their mouths to their identical eyes. How had she missed something so obvious?

"Brenda Leigh Johnson, I'd like you to meet my brother, Richard Raydor," Sharon said dryly, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

"So _this_ is the woman I've been hearing so much about." Richard held out his hand and Brenda stared at it in wonder, an uncomfortable lump forming in her throat. "It's very nice to have a face to match the name."

Brenda slowly slipped her clammy palm against his, allowing him to guide their clasped hands in a firm handshake. She smiled politely and looked between the two of them. "It's a pleasure." She swallowed tightly. "I'm sorry, but may I use your powder room? I think I may be sick."

Sharon stared out the living room window, watching the old woman across the street step outside and place a letter in the mailbox. Behind her, the faint sound of running water from the sink in the bathroom masked the sound of Brenda's vomiting. She pinched the bridge of her nose and closed her eyes.

"That was...different," Richard remarked, coming to stand beside her.

"I apologize. I have no idea what's gotten into her."

He watched her for a moment, the faintest twitch of his eyebrow indicating his disbelief.

"Don't," she warned.

"I didn't say a thing," he replied, raising his hands in supplication.

"You didn't have to." She wandered away from him into the kitchen, where she set about making a cup of mint tea to ease the stomach of her neurotic friend-the same woman who was, for some reason, not okay and who had kissed her.

"I'm, uh, I'm really sorry."

Brenda's small, cringing voice startled the older woman and she whirled. How had Brenda tip-toed in here in those heels? Maybe they taught you that at CIA school. In fact, if female agents dressed the way they did in the movies and on TV, it would _have_ to be part of the training.

Sharon realized the blonde was waiting for her to say something. "Don't worry about it." She handed over the waiting cup and saucer. "Mint tea. It will help."

She tried to ignore the way Brenda's huge, luminous eyes were glued to her face as the deputy chief stammered, "I must've eaten somethin' that disagreed with me at dinner."

Sharon hummed and busied herself wiping away a nonexistent speck on the counter. "You're awfully dressed up."

Brenda gazed down at her own fingers picking at the sleeve of her navy silk dress. She recalled that Sharon had complimented her warmly the last time she'd worn it to work (she'd had an important court appearance that day), and realized in the same breath that that was the reason she'd chosen to wear it for her date tonight. She felt sick all over again and gulped at the scalding tea.

The captain didn't speak, and Brenda knew she was awaiting a response to her unasked question. "Yeah, I had a … dinner thing."

Sharon frowned and opened her mouth, no doubt to say something about their planned outing to the movies, and the blonde hastily added, "I'd forgotten about it. So it's just as well that Richard showed up, actually."

"A dinner thing," the taller woman repeated, and her eyebrows arched. "A date?" Brenda nodded a little too earnestly and Sharon continued, "You forgot you had a date?" For a second Sharon looked perplexed, and then her lips thinned. She wasn't fooled in the slightest.

Before she could follow up, Richard lumbered into the kitchen. "He must've been really memorable, then."

Brenda smiled gratefully. "He was," she confirmed ruefully. "Won't be seein' him again."

"You should've come to dinner with us instead," Sharon's brother continued, lightly rubbing his sister's shoulder, and again Brenda kicked herself for not having immediately noticed the resemblance. As she studied them side by side, she was hammered over the head with the similarity of their lean, clean-lined forms, their perfect straight noses, even the shape of their hands. Some great detective she was.

"Tomorrow night?"

Distracted, it took Brenda a couple of seconds to register what Richard was asking, and then she instinctively looked to her friend for help, for a cue. Sharon gazed back at her, her eyes dark and opaque.

"Oh, well, uh, I might have to work."

"I know," Richard returned with an easy affability that reminded the chief of Daniel. "Sharon might have to work, too. But if you aren't off engaging in very important police-type activities, come over tomorrow night at seven. I'm cooking, and I'm a much better cook than my sister."

Brenda grinned weakly. "Sure." She darted a look at the clock on the microwave. "And I should probably be goin'. I just dropped by to say hi and, ah, meet Richard." _And kiss you and throw up in your bathroom._

She was beginning to think that she'd gotten off easy - that because of Richard's presence, Sharon wasn't going to press, wasn't going to ask the hard questions, like why she'd scrounged up a last-minute date of desperation and just what the _actual_ fuck Brenda Leigh had thought she was doing by grabbing her and kissing her.

Unlikely.

Sharon's eyes narrowed. "Don't rush off," she said, her tone excessively pleasant. "Come into the living room and join us. Stay a while. _I insist_."

Brenda Leigh swallowed another small sip of her tea, swishing the mint around subtly to take away the last remnants of hot, sour bile. No way could she refuse twice in one day when Sharon insisted.

When Brenda nodded and began to follow Sharon toward the living room, Richard playfully yanked on a lock of his sister's hair. "Go ahead, Sherry. I'll be right there."

"Sherry, huh?" Brenda repeated with a bright smile, seizing any possible conversational diversion and running with it.

"Don't even think about it," the other woman returned humorlessly.

Brenda stood awkwardly on the edge of the brightly striped rug, hoping Sharon would sit first and she'd figure out what to do with herself. But having clearly picked up on her friend's anxiety, the captain stood resolutely in the middle of the room, arms folded.

"I didn't know you had a brother."

"But I told you I had a - _Oh_." Brenda looked up from her perusal of a chair leg in time to see understanding and something else dawn in those warm green eyes.

"Yeah, 'oh.' I thought you meant you had a twin sister."

The older woman grinned crookedly. "I told you I looked much better in a skirt," she reminded, and at last sat down at one end of the sofa.

Brenda gingerly sat at the opposite end, wishing she were instead sitting in her car or, better yet, in her apartment. She hadn't wished so strongly for the ability to turn back the clock in years. "I thought you were just bein' cute," Brenda said after a moment of silence.

"I'm always cute," Sharon deadpanned. Despite her attempt to lighten the mood, neither of them was smiling. She sighed. "Brenda...why did you kiss me?"

"Why did _you_ kiss _me_ first?" Brenda spat back, plucking at the hem of her dress, pulling it as far over her knees as the material would allow.

It took a great deal of resolve for Sharon to refrain from rolling her eyes. "I know what this is about."

"Would you care to share with the class?"

"You were jealous. You thought I was seeing Richard, so you went on a date with some stranger to get back at me."

Humiliation burned anew in Brenda's cheeks and she stared at the floor, wishing that it might just open up and swallow her whole. Her silence was all the response Sharon needed.

The older woman gave a derisive snort. "Do you really feel so threatened by the possibility of me spending time with other people who aren't you? You don't have any other friends of your own, and you don't want me to either?"

Whatever Brenda was expecting Sharon to say, it wasn't that. "_What_?"

"I knew you were possessive, but this is a little excessive, even for you."

Brenda laughed. Smart, rational Sharon Raydor was wrong-for once. The deputy chief would have gloated, reveling in the minute victory, but she found herself far more concerned with making the other woman understand what even she had difficulty grasping.

"That's not why I went on a date. I was-I was so mad and so hurt and...I didn't kiss you because I'm lonely."

"Why else would you?"

"Because I _wanted _to."

Sharon blinked and slowly licked her lips, unaware that the habitual act had pulled Brenda's gaze away from her eyes and directly to her mouth. Brenda had wanted to kiss her and so she had, and now she was looking at her as if she wanted to do it again. Something coiled tight and hot in Sharon's stomach, a tense spring just waiting to be released. She struggled to find something to say and, when words failed her, she simply latched onto Brenda's. "You wanted to kiss me."

Brown eyes gave an exaggerated roll. "I wouldn't have done it otherwise, would I? If kissin' you was so horrible the first time, why would I have done it again?" She pursed her lips and twisted her body on the sofa until she was directly facing the captain, her dress rising a little higher up her thigh. "Is that why you're pressin' this so much? You hated kissin' me and didn't wanna do it again? Was it that horrible?"

The captain's heart hammered uncomfortably in her chest. Everything about this situation made her want to retreat back inside her head. How could she possibly admit that she had been unable to think about anything other than the kiss they shared without also giving voice to the confusing jumble of thoughts and worries in her mind? "It wasn't horrible, Brenda Leigh."

The blonde nodded, watching her closely, hoping to read any shift in her carefully closed features. "Why is it that when you initiate the kissin', we can pretend it never happened, but when I do it, you have to talk about it till the cows come home? I don't think that's a very fair double standard, now is it?"

"Because I need to understand," Sharon responded abruptly, with a flicker of fire as if a match had been struck. She was sitting so rigidly that it was a relief to her, and probably to Brenda as well, when she sprang to her feet and planted herself in front of the other woman, hands balled into fists at her thighs. "Look, I - Brenda -" She distractedly ran her fingers through her hair, swiping it back from the crown of her head, and she knew the younger woman saw that her hand was shaking. "You know, I was always the quiet one. The shy, awkward one who inevitably picked the wrong moment to be too opinionated or laugh too loudly. Richard was the gregarious one, the popular one. I never minded. I liked my own little world with my books and nature walks and old movies, and he shared his friends with me."

The change of subject seemed so abrupt that Brenda Leigh blinked rapidly, startled, as her thoughts scrambled to catch up. "Okay," she said quietly, waiting for Sharon to go on.

"I never had to make my own friends until I went away to college and didn't have Richard there to do it for me," the captain continued frankly. "I did all right, but the point is that I've never been good at it, Brenda. And somewhere along the way life happened and I stopped trying, stopped bothering. What I'm saying -" She paused for several seconds, her eyes meeting Brenda's directly and scrutinizing. " - is that I haven't had a really close friend for a long time. You - your friendship means a great deal to me, and if I behaved inappropriately the other night..."

"You didn't," Brenda murmured softly. Her cheeks felt hot. She couldn't figure out if Sharon was apologizing or chastising her or trying to let her down easily or what. For someone who was normally so direct, Sharon Raydor wasn't very easy to read when it came to personal matters. "Unless you're sayin' you think it was inappropriate."

"No. I - No." Sharon whipped her glasses off with one hand, not caring whether she warped the frames, and rubbed at the bridge of her nose. "What I'm saying, only I'm doing it badly, is that God only knows how it happened, but you're my best friend, and I have no intention of jeopardizing that." Her eyes locked on Brenda's again then, wide and anxious and startlingly vulnerable without the shield of her glasses. "Because I sure as hell need a friend, Brenda."

Instinctively Brenda rose, both of her hands reaching out to touch Sharon lightly above her elbows. "You've got one," she reassured the taller woman, smiling a watery smile and only mildly embarrassed that she had to blink back tears and that her voice was unnaturally thick. "You've got me, okay? I'm not goin' anywhere."

Sharon's arms went around her, hugging so tightly that for a second Brenda was startled. Then she returned the hug just as fiercely, soothingly patting the other woman's back in the process.

"Okay," Sharon agreed, her warm breath tickling the hair at Brenda's ear. "I'm not going anywhere either, Brenda. Not even if I do trip over some drop-dead gorgeous man who wants to sweep me off my feet."

"Or drive you off in his Italian sports car," the younger woman suggested, resting her smooth, warm cheek against Sharon's.

"Did yours have a sports car?" the captain asked, sounding mildly intrigued.

Brenda nodded, causing her curls to tickle Sharon's skin. "And a weema - wima - a dog named Butch."

Sharon giggled.

"Sharon, he ordered my food for me," Brenda admitted tragically.

The other woman responded with an exaggerated shudder, and they both chuckled. And then they laughed. And then they laughed some more.

The rap on the door frame was, Brenda decided, a thoughtful touch. "Everything okay?"

Sharon didn't spring away from the other woman this time, but turned in Brenda's embrace to face her brother. "Oh, fine." She lightly patted blonde curls where they lay against the smaller woman's back. "Brenda Leigh just had a bad date."

"Terrible date," she confirmed cheerfully, breathing in the subtly spicy, clean scent she'd learned to associate with the captain. "But I'm feelin' much better now."

Sharon's eyes sparkled and her teeth flashed in her quick, knowing smile. "It was probably the tea."

"Probably," the deputy chief agreed, and impulsively leaned forward to hug her friend again. "Now I really do have to go, but I'll see y'all tomorrow night." Finally stepping away from Sharon, she held her hand out to the woman's twin. "Richard, _so_ nice to meet you. I look forward to talkin' some more over dinner. I want to hear _all_ the dirt."

Richard smirked, an expression that was uncannily familiar. "Somehow I suspect you might have more dirt on my sister than I do."

Sharon whacked him across the midsection with the back of her hand and smiled guilelessly. "Good night, Brenda."

"Good night," the younger woman echoed. She really was feeling much better than she had when she'd arrived, she reassured herself. And if her eyes lingered on Sharon's a few seconds too long and she felt a blush creep over her flesh as she finally turned away, well, where was the big deal in that?

And really, if Brenda listened to the rational little voice in her head, perhaps it had been for the best that Sharon had resolutely steered them away from hastily rushing into anything outside the bounds of friendship. She couldn't deny that she was disappointed, but she chose to focus instead on the affirmation of the _platonic_ relationship they shared.

The relief that continued to course through her with the new-found knowledge that Richard was Sharon's brother, not her mystery lover, was, Brenda insisted to herself, perfectly natural, and nothing at all to feel guilty about. She never had liked to share; and tonight's experience with the not-so-good doctor had left her feeling that looking elsewhere for companionship was just too risky. Having Sharon all to herself was... comfortable. Wasn't that what friends were for?

After Brenda had left, Sharon crossed to the front door and flipped the lock. When she turned around, she was greeted by the wall of Richard's chest.

"So that's Brenda Leigh," he said, his eyes gleaming.

"That is Brenda Leigh." She ducked around her brother and stopped by the back of the sofa, fussily readjusting the throw. She felt his acute eyes tracking her every minute movement.

"The two of you seem very... _close_."

A teeny, tiny part of the captain was tempted to use that psychic twin connection, exploit the fact that Richard often understood her better than she understood herself. Maybe he could explain this situation with a certain brilliant, maddening, unexpectedly sweet, drawling, beautiful bitch of a deputy chief. He could tell her why her lips had tingled and her heart had pounded when Brenda had pressed their lips together and oh-so-lightly stroked her cheek, and why that had scared her worse than having a loaded Glock cocked at her temple. Perhaps he could break it down into simple, monosyllabic words she might actually comprehend.

But on second thought, the last thing he needed after nearly fifty-five years was more ammunition to use against her. He'd never let her live down the desperate crush she'd had on his best friend throughout high school, or the time their mother had had to make her an emergency appointment with the dentist because she'd been practicing her kissing technique on her pillow and her braces had gotten horribly snagged on the lacy sham.

Sharon planted her hands on her hips and fixed her beloved twin with a steely glare. "Don't you dare start," she warned in her most no-nonsense tone. "Don't forget, Richard: Sister Sherry is licensed to carry a concealed weapon."


	15. Chapter 15

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Fandom: The Closer (Brenda/Sharon)**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 8280**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: We are SO sorry for the lengthy break between posts - is it just us, or does real life tend to get a little more hectic in the springtime? Anyway, we're reasonably confident that this chapter will more than make up for the delay. When we first began talking about writing this story together, this is one of the scenarios that we were determined to write. Please enjoy and let us know what you think. Comments will totes shorten the time between posts.**

**Chapter 15: My Favorite Wife**

Most of the time, Sharon Raydor loved her job. She excelled in the no-nonsense, by-the-book atmosphere of FID, wholeheartedly appreciating that she could do her work (and do it well) without the inconvenience of excessive socializing getting in the way. She didn't mind the fact that being a captain in IA made her an outsider who was often regarded with mistrust by her fellow officers; she was there, after all, to do her job, not make friends. It didn't hurt that officers of the LAPD were always getting into trouble, keeping her busy enough to avoid thinking about her personal life.

It was therefore no surprise to Sharon that everyone had been on their best behavior over the past few days, leaving her with more free time than she cared for. She sat in her office, filling out the dreaded but necessary performance reviews, and reluctantly gave her mind free reign to wander to thoughts of the person who unintentionally demanded the majority of her attention.

A small voice in the most sensible recesses of her mind reminded Sharon that these newly arisen complications in her friendship with Brenda could have been avoided if they spent less time with each other or at least had other friends upon whom they could depend. They had somehow crept into the unfamiliar territory of co-dependence, needing each other far more than Sharon was admittedly comfortable with. It unsettled her to know how much she relied upon Brenda's unwavering friendship; how healthy could it be to spend so much of her free time in the company of one person? What would happen when, inevitably, Sharon needed her and Brenda wasn't there?

She'd been mollified by their conversation on the night Brenda had shown up at her house, and comforted even more by Brenda's presence the following evening when they shared dinner with Richard.

No, it wasn't necessarily a good thing to be fifty-four and entirely dependent upon the friendship of one woman-especially one woman she had enjoyed kissing more than the rules of platonic relationships would allow.

Despite having come to this conclusion with the help of her keenly logical rationale, Sharon knew that she didn't _want_ to make other friends. She didn't want to spend time with other people. She most certainly didn't want to date anyone.

The thought terrified her.

Her phone pulled her from her reverie and she was thankful for the reprieve-that is, until Will Pope ordered her to meet him in the Murder Room immediately.

Her thoughts clacking as loudly and rapidly as her heels, the captain set off for the suite of offices two floors down, taking the stairs to burn off a little excess energy. Pope summoning her to the Murder Room didn't bode particularly well. Surely he wasn't foisting yet another audit on her; and if there was a new case that was a joint Major Crimes-FID investigation, she would've been notified through channels. No, there was something rotten in the Murder Room. It reeked of Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson's scheming from a mile away.

The quick, sidelong glance Brenda darted at her from beneath lowered lashes immediately confirmed that impression, even as Sharon murmured, "Chief Pope, Chief Johnson. Gentlemen."

Tao offered her a little two-fingered wave. Flynn smirked.

"Let's go into your office," Pope said to Brenda as if it were a suggestion, and gestured for Sharon to precede him. Green eyes bored into a bargain-basement butter-yellow cardigan (really, as a friend, she was going to have to do something about overhauling the woman's wardrobe) as Brenda led the way. _What are you up to now, Brenda Leigh?_

"Sergeant Rodney Crowther," Pope began abruptly, facing Sharon and leaning against Brenda's desk. "Remember him?"

Sharon blinked rapidly, but before she could say that of _course_ she remembered Rodney, she hadn't suddenly gone senile, Brenda fluttered her fingers anxiously and interjected, "No, no, let me tell her."

"Tell me what, chief?"

"Actually I'll show you." The blonde opened a file folder lying on her desk, revealing several glossy photos that she spread out like a mosaic, and pages of a typed report. Sharon didn't blink at the lurid stab wounds depicted, only adjusting her glasses better to scrutinize them.

"This isn't Rodney," she said immediately.

"No, this is Derek Weller. He was killed six weeks ago during an apparent home invasion in Silver Lake. His domestic partner is still in intensive care at Cedars. The doctors don't expect him to regain consciousness."

"And you think this is related to what happened to Rodney four years ago?" Sharon returned in that same low, even tone.

"I'm sure it is, and unfortunately Mr. Weller and Mr. Maher aren't the only new victims." Two other folders joined the one the deputy chief had already opened. "Annalise Langley and Catrina Sharp, murdered three weeks ago in their duplex in Studio City; and Karen and Deborah Millican-Crewe, murdered the day before yesterday in their Malibu beach house. Three couples, three completely different areas. Other than the manner of their deaths, they have only two things in common: they were all in same-sex partnerships, and they all bought new homes within the last six months from Heller-Manley Real Estate."

The captain nodded stiffly. "I see."

"Sergeant Crowther and his partner had also recently purchased a home, hadn't they, captain?"

They had, and Brenda knew they had, and Sharon knew Brenda knew they had, but she still quietly answered, "Yes." She'd gone to their housewarming party. She remembered how luxurious the champagne-colored carpet had felt as her heels had sunk into it, and what it had looked like a few months later, splattered with Rodney and Thomas's mingled blood like a Jackson Pollock from hell.

She swallowed. "No doubt you've already thoroughly investigated everyone at Heller-Manley."

"Exhaustively." Brenda tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and Sharon took in just how exhausted the younger woman herself looked. She wondered how much Brenda had slept during the last forty-eight hours. "And I've got Tao and Sanchez goin' over all of it again, but it's a tiny, independent firm owned by Wendy Heller and Blake Manley. Two of the couples dealt with Ms. Heller, one with Mr. Manley; the two couples that had mortgages got them from different lenders; and none of our victims knew each other. So far all we have is two seriously spooked realtors and six - eight - dead men and women."

"Heller-Manley - that name doesn't ring a bell."

Brenda shook her head. "No, they're a new operation, just opened their doors about eight months ago. Sergeant Crowther and Mr. Rios dealt with one of the big national firms. Neither Heller nor Manley worked there at the time."

Sharon nodded, her hands finding their way into the pockets of her blazer. "Thank you, chief. I appreciate your courtesy in informing me."

"I knew you'd want to know. Sergeant Crowther was one of your people." Brenda cocked her head and fixed the taller woman with a direct stare. "But that's not the only reason I asked Will to bring you in on this one."

"Bring me in?" Sharon's right hand emerged from her pocket to remove her glasses, and her eyes met the other woman's without any impediment between them.

The blonde summoned a smile and even forced a peppy little lilt into her voice as she replied, "How do you feel about a little undercover work, Capt'n Raydor?"

The captain blinked and darted a quick look at the acting Chief of Police, whose face was a mixture of bemused annoyance. "You want _me_ to go undercover," Sharon repeated, raising an eyebrow at the two of them.

"For the record, I'm not fond of this idea," Will stated, puffing his chest out a little.

Brenda waved a hand, dismissing his disapproval as if he hadn't spoken at all. "I'm afraid I need you with me on this," she continued, cocking her hip against the window pane. "We don't have much to go on here, but we've turned up nothin' but loose ends since we started this case. We've run out of other options."

"If I'm understanding this correctly, you want a captain and a deputy chief to go undercover as a lesbian couple to lure out a homophobic murderer with connections to a real estate company."

"You've got the general idea," Pope added dryly. "I know it's not ideal-"

"I was gonna send in Flynn and Gabriel," Brenda added, cutting him off, "but we've got intel that a lesbian couple has just closed on a Heller-Manley house. I don't wanna take any chances that they'll end up the next target while we're goin' through the motions of settin' up cover for someone else. Besides," she added wryly, moving across the room to sit at her desk, "I don't have any other women in Major Crimes and I'd rather not have to call in Detective Mendoza."

Sharon knew of Mikki Mendoza and her reputation as an exceedingly beautiful, flirtatious bisexual. She imagined the detective playing house with Brenda and immediately bristled. "That won't be necessary. I'm familiar with Rodney's case-I should be the one going in."

As Sharon considered the reality of her own possessiveness, a voice in the back of her head added, _If anyone should be posing as Brenda's lover, it's me_...

The blonde smiled. "Good. We're graspin' at straws, but it's the only lead we've got."

"I'm counting on you to keep this as low-key as possible," Will urged, his pointed gaze shared between the two women. "The last thing this department needs is two of its highest ranking officers getting themselves killed. We don't have unlimited resources here to pay for an elaborate waiting game to stake out a suspect, so get this done quickly and conservatively."

"Right," Brenda drawled, "I'll just make sure to let the killer know that we need him or her to abide by the LAPD's projected timeline."

Sharon held back a smirk.

"Look, Will," Brenda continued seriously, "if we don't want this to become a sensationalized killing spree of LA's gay community, we need to act quickly. Captain Raydor and I can handle this."

The bald man frowned. "Do what you have to do. Be careful."

They watched him leave Brenda's office, stopping to speak with Provenza. Brenda let out a huff. "Honestly, you think the man could give a pep talk every now and then."

"And to think, you could have been the one in charge..."

Brenda narrowed her eyes. "Don't start up with that again." She rifled through a stack of folders on her desk and squinted to read the names on the side. Plucking her glasses from the neck of her blouse, Brenda put them on and found the specific file she was looking for. "Here we go. Susan and Jean Hennessey, Chicago natives, have been married since '02. We flagged them as we began investigatin' the most recent murders."

Sharon replaced her glasses and began scanning the proffered material. "You just couldn't resist, could you?" she asked, her eyes focused on the profile.

"Resist what?"

The captain looked up with a grin. "Jumping at an opportunity to play my wife."

Brenda's cheeks bloomed with color. "I didn't hear you offerin' up all that much protest."

"There's only one small problem."

The blonde quirked an eyebrow.

"There's no way I can realistically pretend to be married to a woman who dresses like a refugee from a factory outlet."

The deputy chief's jaw dropped. "This outfit is from a perfectly normal store!"

"Brenda, if that sweater isn't from Old Navy, I'll eat my glasses."

"What's wrong with Old Navy?" she demanded indignantly, hands planted on her sharply jutting hips.

"Old Navy is where polyester goes to die."

"Seriously? We're goin' undercover to try to find the person or persons responsible for seven deaths, and you're worryin' about my poly-cotton blend?"

"It would be easy enough to go shopping after work."

Brenda scowled.

Sharon again removed her glasses and folded them precisely, placing them atop the file. "Fine, then. I thought that was what you'd say, so you have to be Jean, and I'll be Susan."

The scowl turned into a perplexed frown. "What has that got to do with anything?"

"Susan is a highly successful educator; she wouldn't be caught dead in a poly-cotton blend."

The younger woman rolled her eyes. "Whatever."

"I hope you enjoy gardening." Brenda's eyes widened, and Sharon said, "You haven't actually read these, have you?" Brenda didn't answer, but no answer was necessary. The captain snickered. "Jean Hennessey is a master gardener. She works as a landscaping consultant. So you can look forward to spending lots of time on your knees." Sharon smirked at her own little joke. "In the dirt."

Brenda whipped the file folder away from Sharon so quickly that the dark-haired woman's eye was caught by the sudden red bloom of a paper cut on her index finger before she even felt the sting. "I was gonna be Jean anyway. Susan's the old one."

Sharon gaped, the perfect image of outraged vanity, and Brenda flashed her a wide smile. "Now you'd better run on home and pack, captain. The movin' truck's comin' tomorrow morning."

Sharon stood, gripping the file on Susan Hennessy in the hand that wasn't bleeding, and stalked toward the office door. "Is it a U-Haul?" she tossed over her shoulder.

Brenda Leigh's eyelashes fluttered quickly. "Huh?"

Sharon looked over back, eyebrows raised humorously. "Well, we're lesbians now, Brenda Leigh."

The younger woman stared vacantly.

"You know, lesbians? U-Hauling?" When Brenda's expression didn't change, Sharon rolled her eyes in disgust and waved vaguely with the folder. "Forget it. Somehow I suspect my second marriage isn't going to work out any better than my first did. I'll see you tomorrow, _honey_. Please wear natural fibers."

All things considered, Brenda Leigh found that the third time around, married life certainly _was_ a charm. She watched with barely concealed glee as Gabriel, Tao, and Buzz, disguised as moving men and a cable guy, carried boxes into the house. She gave them a little wave, delighting in the fact that she had the easiest job of everyone in the division. Pretending to be married to Sharon Raydor (and catching a bad guy or two) would be a piece of cake compared to the tedious office work and surveillance the rest of them would be assigned.

She followed them inside and, as they set to work bugging the house, she went in search of her wife.

"Yoohoo, Suzie Q!" she called out, skipping up the stairs while men bustled down on the floor below. She peeked inside the guest room and master bath before finding Sharon in the master bedroom-the very same bedroom that they would be sharing. Together. At the same time.

"We've been married for an hour and twenty minutes and you've already assigned me a horrible pet name?" Sharon asked, glowering over the rims of her glasses. She unpacked her suitcase of essentials and Brenda watched, amused, as the other woman made an awkward show of hiding her underwear.

"Oh, there's plenty more where that came from, sweet pea." Brenda winked and flopped onto the bed, disrupting the captain's neat stacks of clothes.

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Isn't there something you should be doing? Unpacking, perhaps?"

"I am doin' somethin'. I'm delegatin'." The blonde let out an exaggerated sigh. "It's not easy bein' Jean Hennessey."

"Clearly Jean wears the pants in the relationship."

"You're the one wearin' pants, not me."

"Why Brenda Leigh, are you suggesting that I'm the man in this relationship?"

"Of course not," Brenda said, heaving herself off the bed and flattening her skirt. "There _is_ no man in this relationship. That's what makes this such a beautiful, _lesbian_ union." She nudged Sharon with her elbow and headed for the door. "Oh, by the way, the boys are settin' up downstairs. For all of Will's boo-hooin' about costs and all that, he sure is footin' a hefty bill to spring for all this surveillance equipment."

Sharon snorted. "You know they're all waiting to see how long it takes before we kill each other."

"Or how long until..._you know_..." Brenda wiggled her eyebrows suggestively and giggled when Sharon's cheeks darkened. "Oh you are too easy, Sharon."

Sharon raised an eyebrow, not taking the bait that the blonde had so clearly set out for her. Disappointed, Brenda turned to go back downstairs.

"Oh-before I forget." Sharon turned around, pulling something out of her back pocket. "I figured you'd need this." She placed a thin gold band in Brenda's palm.

Something tingled pleasantly in Brenda's stomach. "What about you? Don't you need one?"

The captain held up her left hand, showing off a similar ring. "It's my wedding ring."

Jealousy flitted quickly over Brenda's features. But why in heaven's name should it bother her if Sharon wore a ring from her previous _real_ marriage? "Where'd this one come from, evidence?"

The brunette smiled slightly. "No, it was my mother's. I thought it would fit you." She reached for Brenda's left hand, removing the ring from her palm and carefully sliding it onto the third finger, taking care not to chafe or scrape. "You have the same delicate hands."

Brenda stared, fascinated, at the warm, smooth hand cradling hers and the muted glimmer of the gold band. "Oh, Sharon, your mama's ring? I'll take good care of it."

Sharon squeezed the other woman's hand in both of hers before releasing it. "I know." She flashed a quick smile before taking a step away, aware that the moment had felt more intimate than she'd intended.

"This is a nice house."

The older woman hummed. "It's enormous. Can you imagine rattling around by yourself in all this space? - Beautiful view down into the canyon, though."

"Of course Jean and Susan will be here together, not by themselves," the deputy chief pointed out as a resounding crash rang out from down the hall. She and Sharon exchanged a glance. "I hope that wasn't anythin' important. Good thing Gabriel and Tao went into law enforcement instead of movin'."

The doorbell rang.

Sharon raised her eyebrows as Brenda Leigh pursed her lips. "Welcome wagon?" the captain suggested facetiously.

Brenda flounced down the stairs with Sharon, who did not enjoy bringing up the rear, so hot on her heels that the two of them scuffled and knocked into one another as they both reached for the doorknob. Over Brenda's shoulder the captain caught a glimpse of Gabriel's face wearing an expression of extreme trepidation and easily divined his thoughts:_ If they're already jockeying to see who goes first, how long until the commencement of World War III?_

Sharon almost wished she thought days spent alone in this house with Brenda Leigh would lead to a knock-down, drag-out fight. That she'd know how to handle.

Her slightly longer fingers succeeded in turning the knob and the door swung open.

"Hello! You must be the Hennesseys. I'm Wendy Heller. It's so nice to meet you in person, finally," gushed the petite blonde, practically vibrating with nervous energy.

"I'm Jean," Brenda volunteered before Sharon could even open her mouth. "And this is my _wife_, Susan." Sharon managed to refrain from an eye-roll at the unwarranted emphasis, and Brenda's arm snaked around her waist, yanking their hips together. _Subtle_, thought Sharon.

"Thank you for helping us find this beautiful house," 'Susan' said, extending her own hand more sedately. Wendy's palm was clammy. The woman was clearly as nervous as a cat.

"Well, everything should be just so. The pool was filled yesterday, as we discussed, and your mulch will arrive first thing tomorrow morning." Wendy positively beamed, so eager to please was she.

"Mulch," Brenda repeated dubiously, and Sharon took a vicious pleasure in squeezing her waist a little too tightly.

"For your herb garden, sweetie. You said you wanted to get started as soon as possible."

Brenda smiled faintly. "Oh. Yeah. Great." She turned to look at Sharon, their faces inches apart. "After the movers leave, we can go swimmin' - in March, isn't that great?" She turned her best smile on the realtor. "All this sunshine sure feels good after a long Chicago winter."

"But you're not from Chicago," Wendy said conversationally.

Brenda's eyes narrowed. The realtors weren't supposed to know anything about the undercover operation. If someone had let something slip -

"I mean, your accent -"

"Oh, no," the chief replied airily, her smile back in place in an instant. "I grew up in Georgia. How 'bout you, Wendy? Are you a native Californian?"

"Oh, no. Midwest." The small blonde smoothed a nonexistent crease from her skirt. "I just wanted to make sure you'd arrived and are settling in all right."

Sharon smiled politely. "Yes. The last of our furniture won't be here until next week, but we've got the essentials."

"Everything in the bedroom," Brenda chimed in suggestively, and Sharon flinched. Wendy looked uncomfortable.

"Just call the office if you need anything or have any questions, or you can reach me on my cell at any time." Recovering her smile, the realtor handed Sharon her card. "And, oh, the security system - It's state of the art. You know how to activate it, right?"

"Oh, we probably won't use it," Brenda said casually, and Sharon offered a "what-can-you-do?" smile.

"Jeannie's so forgetful. You wouldn't believe how many times she managed to trip the alarm at our last place. We were practically on a first-name basis with the entire Chicago Police Department." Sharon laughed brightly, as if to say, _The little woman, ain't she cute_, and felt Brenda glaring daggers at her. "Besides, I'm sure this is a very safe area."

"Oh, well, yes, of course." Wendy chewed fretfully on her lower lip, gnawing away her bright pink lipstick. "But with a beautiful home like this - property crime -"

"We'll consider it," Brenda promised in a tone designed to make it clear that they wouldn't. "Thanks _so_ much for stoppin' by. You have a real nice day, now."

The two women exchanged a long look after the door had safely closed behind the realtor. "By any chance did she strike you as just the slightest bit nervous?"

"A smidge," Sharon agreed with a smirk. She folded her arms as she turned to survey the action in 'their' living room. "But wouldn't you be, if your clients were being murdered in their beds? It's certainly bad for business. - Buzz, do we actually have cable?"

"Basic, ma'am. No HBO or anything."

"At least we'll have something to keep us entertained while we wait for our friendly neighborhood slasher to turn up," Sharon said cheerfully, heading for the back of the house. "Let's go see where your herb garden is going to be, babe."

"I'm more interested in the pool." Sharon didn't have to look to know that the other woman's eyes were twinkling as they stepped out onto the patio and she added, "You know, honey, even without cable, I'm sure we could find _plenty_ of ways to keep ourselves occupied."

The older woman snorted. "Jesus, Brenda, are you going to be this insufferable the entire time we have to be married? If so, I'm filing for divorce."

Chocolate eyes blinked, their owner's expression one of exaggerated innocence. "What? I meant swimmin'."

Sharon sighed. "Yeah, of course you did."

"Your mind sure is quick to jump to thoughts of sex," Brenda added, leaning over the railing to smell the budding flowers of a small tree-which she'd probably have to identify if she was quizzed about Jean's job. "We _are_ married now. If you wanna indulge in all of the perks of married life, all you have to do is ask."

If Sharon was a little bit cool and withdrawn when they made their way back inside, she was careful to keep it hidden from Brenda. "If I have to ask, that sort of defeats the purpose, doesn't it?" She inspected the kitchen, testing the garbage disposal and dishwasher. "Besides, Jean and Susan have been married for ten years. Most of the magic is probably gone."

"Well, we're not Jean and Susan, are we?" Brenda asked quietly, quirking a suggestive eyebrow.

"Exactly," Sharon replied, her voice a little harder than she had anticipated. She directed a pointed look at the younger woman, who was visibly perplexed, and nearly walked straight into Tao as he appeared in the doorway.

"Hey, Chief?" he said, holding up a bright blue envelope. "Wendy Heller just stuck this in your mailbox."

The captain was relieved that the deputy chief's attention was now firmly fixed on work. "Guess she forgot to give it to us when we spoke."

"The sign of a truly anxious woman," Brenda announced, plucking the envelope from Tao's fingers. She tore open the seal and pulled out the cardstock tucked inside. "Heller-Manley Realty sponsors a monthly mixer for its new homeowners to, well, mix, I guess. The next one is tomorrow."

"Ah, a box social," Tao supplied with a nostalgic smile. "How quaint."

"I wonder if our killer will be at the meet-n'-greet." Sharon peered over Brenda's shoulder, studying the invitation.

"It'd be great if he introduced himself as a wanted sociopath with a penchant for murdering gay people," Brenda drawled sarcastically, sticking the invitation to the refrigerator.

"Why do you assume that our murderer is a man?" Sharon asked, cocking her hands on her hips. Tao's eyes widened at the challenging tone in the captain's voice and he immediately retreated into the hall.

"I'm not assumin' anythin'...but there _is _a higher incidence of men engaged in hate crimes than women."

Sharon rolled her eyes. "Homophobia is not restricted to the male population. Just you watch - our suspect will turn out to be a woman."

"You wouldn't be sayin' that if you weren't so suspicious of Heller."

"I certainly would."

Brenda laughed breathlessly. "Well, let's hope that we find out sooner rather than later which one of us is right. I miss Sugar."

"She's in good hands," Sharon said, patting the younger woman's shoulder. "Daniel will take good care of her."

"If she and Manzana don't demolish your house first," Brenda retorted with a laugh, leaving Sharon to stare at her retreating form with an expression of outright horror on her face.

By the time everyone had gone and the majority of their prop furniture had been moved in and the surveillance equipment had been installed, Brenda and Sharon had time for a late dinner before mutually agreeing that they were ready to succumb to exhaustion.

They made the trek upstairs in silence and took turns in the bathroom. When Sharon finally emerged after stalling for as long as possible, she had to bite her lip at the sight of Brenda Leigh dressed in short shorts and a tank top, sitting on her side of the bed while she lathered lotion onto her long, lean legs. Cheeks flushed, Sharon resolutely busied herself with brushing her hair and pulling on a pair of socks before finally running out of things to do. She avoided looking at Brenda's limbs as she crossed over to her side of the bed, pulling open the drawer of the nightstand and checking the clip in her service weapon.

"Guess I better not try any funny business," Brenda said, nodding toward the gun at Sharon's bewildered expression.

"This is certainly more effective than 'I have a headache', isn't it?" She climbed onto the bed, fluffing her pillow before slipping beneath the comforter.

"I'm too tired to put the moves on you anyway," Brenda confessed with a sigh. "I'm disappointed though that our marriage bed won't be broken in on our first night together." She moaned lightly as she pressed her thumb into her calf.

The unmistakable sound, so quiet that it was almost unheard, forced Sharon to catch her breath. No-she could most definitely not be thinking such things while sharing a bed with this woman for god only knew how long. She ran her hands through her hair and scooted down into the bed until her head was pressed against the pillow, and then turned on her side, presenting her back to Brenda.

Not Brenda, she reminded herself; Jean. And she was Susan, and the two of them had been legally wed for ten years and together for God only knew how long before that, and the magic was most definitely gone.

"Jean" slid under the covers and wriggled a little, searching for a comfortable position, and in the process her cold, bare toes brushed "Susan's" calf. The blonde released a small, uneasy laugh and said "Sorry." The problem was that she sounded just like Brenda Leigh, smelled just like Brenda Leigh, wriggled around just like Brenda Leigh, and Sharon, not Susan, found it all disturbingly intriguing.

It was going to be a long night.

When Sharon opened her eyes to clear morning sunlight, she knew immediately that she was alone. She'd been aware of Brenda's presence throughout the seemingly interminable night, had felt her there, breathing, each time she swam to consciousness from uneasy half-dreams. This consciousness had made her fight the urge to toss and turn and squirm, and instead hold her body rigid, carefully keeping to her half of the mattress - really more like a third, clinging desperately to the far edge, practically with one foot on the floor. That might help to keep the room from spinning when you'd had too much to drink, but it did nothing to alleviate the effects of too much Brenda. Sharon sat up gingerly. Her muscles creaked and groaned in protest. She felt as if she'd slept on a wooden board.

The bedroom was shockingly bright, sunlight streaming in through the glass wall that gave onto a jaw-dropping view of the canyon below. Sharon gazed out at rocky crags and evergreens, giving her bleary eyes a moment to focus and her brain a chance to lurch into action. The bedside clock told her it was 6:45. It felt odd not to be stumbling into the shower and preparing to rush off to work.

She needed coffee.

Her eyes lit up when they confirmed the evidence of her olfactory sense: a fresh pot of coffee awaited her on the kitchen counter. She found a mug and filled it, sloshing in a dollop of skim milk, and took a long drink. Only then did she call, "Brenda?"

There was no answer, and the house was silent. Funny; she hadn't pegged the other woman as an early riser.

The sound of a splash reached her ears, and Sharon followed it outside, firmly gripping her coffee in both hands. Brenda Leigh's body flashed through the water like that of a fish, the water rippling over clean, pale limbs and what looked like a very skimpy black bathing suit. Her form was good, her strokes strong, and it gave Sharon genuine pleasure to watch her swim laps. She imagined the stretch of Brenda's muscles, the tingling burn as she pushed herself, the way the tips of her fingers would pulse with her heartbeat.

The brunette felt her cheeks grow warm.

Brenda's strokes ceased and she popped up like a buoy, bobbing just at Sharon's feet. "Mornin', Suzie Q," she greeted her with a bright grin.

Sharon stiffened as if Brenda had thrown a bucket of pool water in her face. "Jean," she responded coolly.

The blonde flipped onto her back and began to float. "I think Jean starts every day with a swim," she declared. "How 'bout Susan? Come on in and join me. The water's perfect, and it's not like we have anywhere to be."

The captain took a step back. "I didn't bring a swimsuit," she lied, and then wondered why.

"Sharon Raydor, what is the matter with you? If we have to sit around in this house waitin' for somebody to show up and try to murder us, the least we can do is enjoy this huge, beautiful pool. And look at the view!" She gestured over her shoulder toward the canyon. "You can borrow my other suit."

Sharon gaped. "And use it as what, Brenda Leigh? Dental floss?"

Brenda huffed and flipped a sodden curl that had escaped from her ponytail out of her face. "So run home and get one."

"We're on an undercover operation," the older woman pointed out sternly. "I can't 'run home.'"

"So go out and buy one! This is Los Angeles; there're stores. You're just bein' difficult."

"I'll pass."

"Suit yourself." Brenda scissored her legs in a powerful kick and began a lazy backstroke.

"I feel like cooking." That wasn't precisely true, but she had to do something, so she might as well make breakfast. "How do you like your eggs?"

"Over easy, please, ma'am. With toast."

Sharon's heart pounded until she reached the relative sanctuary of her temporary kitchen. If she had been undercover with anyone else, it would have felt like work. There would have been no easy flirtation or comfortable pull into domestic routines. It was unsurprising that she had taken on the role of the housewife by default; when Brenda had offered to make dinner the night before, Sharon had insisted that she handle the cooking, not wanting to have the house burn down before they'd apprehended their suspect.

It wasn't supposed to feel so natural to be cooking for Brenda Leigh, to be making her breakfast while she got in her morning exercise. It had been comfortable to cook for her as a friend, as she had so many times over the past several months, but something about this was different. Cooking for a friend was one thing; cooking for a wife was quite another.

_Fake wife_, she reminded herself, pulling ingredients out of the fridge. She popped a few slices of bread in the toaster and busied herself with the eggs, pausing for a moment to glance out the window as Brenda began to climb out of the pool. The sizzle of frying eggs was muted over the deafening thrum of her quickening heartbeat as she watched the lithe blonde pull out the elastic that held back her hair, shaking free the excess water before she pulled it back up into a high, messy bun. Water dripped down her scantily-clad form, skimming the generous curves of her breasts and the toned surface of her bare abdomen. When she bent to retrieve her fluffy pink towel, the roundness of her backside forced an unintentional groan from the captain's throat.

As the sound echoed in the silence of the kitchen, Sharon shook her head and turned her flaming face back to the eggs, which would have been ruined had she continued to longingly stare out the window. When the toast popped up unexpectedly, Sharon jumped.

_Get it together, Raydor._

No, if it had been anyone else that she had been undercover with, it would have been all business. Whatever this was between herself and Brenda was frighteningly close to pleasure, and Sharon berated herself for reacting so wantonly to the sight of her friend. Had she ever seen Brenda in such a minimal amount of clothing? Had she ever known how truly beautiful a body the other woman kept hidden beneath ugly floral skirts and poly-blend sweaters?

When the patio door slid open and Brenda walked in, Sharon kept her back to her until she was certain the rosy hue of her cheeks had returned to its preferred pallor.

"You really should think about takin' a dip," Brenda urged, pouring herself another cup of coffee. "The water's great."

"Maybe later," Sharon replied, transferring Brenda's eggs to a plate. "Toast's ready-you can butter it yourself."

"Thanks," the blonde said, humming in delight at the smell of breakfast. "If I'd known how great it was to have a wife, I'd have gotten one ages ago."

"I'm sure your husband would have loved that," Sharon drawled, sneaking a peek at the other woman. She was relieved to see that Brenda had wrapped the towel around her body, covering her sinfully wet assets completely.

"Who knows...maybe he would have." Brenda giggled and placed two more slices of bread into the toaster. "On second thought, I don't think he would have. Male fantasies about two women together aside, Fritz was awfully jealous. He would've hated to share me."

"Smart man," Sharon muttered. "What's on the agenda for today?"

The blonde gave a heavy, exaggerated sigh. "Crawlin' out of my skin, mostly. I _hate_ waitin' around for things to happen."

"Really? I wouldn't have guessed."

"Oh hah hah...aren't you cute?"

It was easy to tease the impatient deputy chief, but Sharon herself felt almost bereft without any files to read, suspects to interview, or paperwork to complete. The empty hours of the day stretched before her as a daunting prospect. It was probably too much to ask that the killer drop by for lunch.

As Sharon headed upstairs to shower and get ready for the day, she paused for a split second and looked directly into the tiny camera Buzz had mounted there with a view of the front door. It was completely undetectable, but the captain knew that the tiny nail in the wall was not, in fact, a tiny nail in the wall. "Morning, boys," she said dryly. She imagined Buzz sitting there in the media room, his eyes already crossing from boredom. She suspected they'd have some sort of betting pool going: how long until the captain and the chief come to blows?

"So the guys are checkin' on these socials."

Brenda's voice made Sharon jump as she stepped out of the en suite bathroom, a towel wrapped around her hair to keep the water from her purple tank-top. The blonde sat on the bed, swaddled in a fluffy pink robe.

Sharon nodded, watching Brenda in the mirror as she unwound the towel and began carefully combing her dark hair. "You think maybe some of our victims had met after all?"

"It's certainly possible. That or they met the killer."

The captain smirked. "What do you suppose one should wear to meet one's would-be murderer?"

"What you have on is nice."

Sharon's eyes again darted toward Brenda's in their reflected image and caught the younger woman in a lingering perusal of the way the pale gray skirt clung to the curves of the captain's posterior. Sharon felt herself flush.

"I don't think it matters what we wear," Brenda continued, unaware that she'd been observed while observing. "But it might matter how we act."

Sharon turned. "Oh?" she asked neutrally.

"These socials may be an excellent opportunity for our killer to observe his - or her," she qualified before the other woman could interrupt, "potential targets. We already know our victims aren't the only same-sex couples who've purchased homes in the greater Los Angeles area in our time frame. They're not even the only ones to buy from Heller-Manley."

"So their behavior sets them apart?"

Brenda nodded. "It may. By all accounts, our six recent victims were in very happy relationships." She crossed her legs and her robe gaped open all the way up to her thigh. Sharon averted her gaze. "Sharon, were Rodney and Thomas -?"

"Completely in love," the older woman replied quietly, looking down at the top of the ultra-modern dresser, where her neatly placed cosmetics mingled with a hodgepodge of Brenda's. "You know, I was the only one at work who even knew Rodney was gay. He told me in part because I was his commanding officer, but I think it had more to do with the knowledge that he could trust me, that it wouldn't matter. I'll never forget their housewarming party. They were... very sweet together."

The chief was quiet for a moment, biting her lip and gazing at her friend as Sharon went about applying moisturizer.

"You know what bothers me?" Sharon screwed the top back on the small jar and again turned to face the other woman. "This four-year gap. One crime, followed by years of nothing, and then three more attacks within weeks of each other?"

Brenda sighed. "I know. We're checkin' prison records, mental institutions, everythin' you can think of, but so far, nothin'. If we can figure that part out, I'm convinced we'll be able to identify the killer. The link between Thomas and Rodney's deaths and the rest of our victims is what's gonna solve this case."

Sharon nodded in agreement. "That's something, at least," she said softly. She felt Brenda's eyes on her again, staring, and finally demanded, "What?"

The younger woman blinked and then colored slightly. "You're really pretty without makeup," she blurted. "You have beautiful skin."

Sharon blinked back, at a loss. "And you're getting chlorine all over the bedspread," she retorted edgily. "Go take a shower."

Brenda rolled her eyes and got to her feet. "Whatever you say, darlin'." She nudged Sharon's hip with her own, pushing her gently aside to open a few drawers and extract a pale pink slip and a pair of purple panties. "Too bad you started without me," Brenda said, meeting Sharon's eye in the mirror. "We coulda showered together...conserved water." She winked and then sauntered off.

Sharon closed her eyes, attempting to channel some sort of calming energy, and wished for a hasty conclusion to this case.

The Heller-Manley Realty mixer was, for all intents and purposes, no more than a low-key cocktail party located in the main office's largest conference hall. The circular conference tables had been cleared out, replaced by smaller tables that were covered with various appetizers and beverages. "Jean and Susan Hennessey" were one of seven other couples that had joined Blake Manley and Wendy Heller (and a small team of caterers and wait staff) for the laid-back occasion.

Sharon, for her part, was not particularly impressed by the gathering. They'd spent an hour discussing the do's and don'ts of home ownership as well as various concerns that had arisen. Blake, a gregarious African American man in his mid-forties, had graciously explained that these mixers were designed to ease the stressors of moving and allow others the opportunity to mingle with couples who were in the same position.

As she carefully handled her glass of white wine, Sharon surveyed each person in the large room, looking for any signs of suspicious behavior. Wendy was as rattled and nervous as ever, her eyes often flitting to the clock. Blake, on the other hand, was pure charisma and charm, effortlessly socializing and fielding questions as if there were nothing more troubling to him than an empty hors d'oeuvres platter.

"Anyone jumpin' out at you?" Brenda asked, leaning in to speak quietly in Sharon's ear.

"No one," Sharon replied. "Everyone."

Brenda laughed breathlessly. "I know what you mean." She angled her body toward Sharon's and brushed the woman's hair behind her shoulder, her fingertips lingering on the captain's shoulder. "I'll feel better once we can do background checks on everyone here...especially those caterers."

Sharon nodded, noticing with muted interest that Blake was guiding a couple in their direction. "Showtime," she mumbled.

Brenda nodded faintly and then leaned in to kiss Sharon's cheek. She smiled brightly and the look of pure affection on her face was so convincing that Sharon lost her breath.

"Susan and Jean Hennessey, I'd like to introduce you to Chuck and Barb Jones," Blake said, flashing a winning smile. "They've bought a house only a few blocks away from you."

"Oh, well we're practically neighbors then!" Brenda enthusiastically shook their hands before slipping her arm possessively around Sharon's waist. "It's so nice to meet some new people...we don't know anyone out here yet!"

"Whereabouts are you from?" Barb asked, her plump face turning with curiosity toward Sharon. "Not native Californians, then?"

"We're from Chicago," Sharon offered. She smiled politely and forced herself to take her free hand out of her pocket to rest it on Brenda's shoulder.

"I've always wanted to go," Barb moaned wistfully, nudging her husband with her fist. "He always said he'd take me but we haven't left the West Coast in _years_."

"If you ever make it out there, I can tell you about all the places you _must_ see. There's this great bistro near Millenium Park that's just _so_ romantic..." Brenda smiled nostalgically at Sharon and squeezed her hip. "You know which one I mean, honey?" Her eyes glowed and she leaned in conspiratorially to Barb. "It's where Suzie proposed. It was just about the most romantic night of my life."

"How long have you been married?" Chuck asked. His hazel eyes gazed intensely at them both before his stare lingered in the slight valley of Brenda's modest cleavage.

Sharon's eyes narrowed momentarily at his leer before she turned a loving smile in Brenda's direction. "Ten happy years."

"Oh, that's wonderful!" Barb grasped Chuck's forearm and squeezed, her cheek brushing his polo-shirt-covered shoulder. "We've only been married three. Second marriage for both of us," she confided, leaning in toward the other women. Having received a decidedly cool look from Brenda, Chuck's attention was already wandering, his eyes tracking a server with a tray of mini egg rolls. "The two of you still seem so _together_. I mean, I know we just met, but the way you look at each other gives me hope," she continued, her face becoming progressively flushed, and Sharon wondered how many glasses of white wine the woman had downed.

This, of course, was an opportunity Brenda Leigh couldn't pass up. "See, sugar? I told you it shows." The blonde wrapped her other arm around Sharon, carefully balancing her wine glass against the taller woman's hip, so that she draped over the captain like a clinging vine. Clinging vines, Sharon reminded herself, determined not to focus on the way the other woman's breasts pressed against her arm, were parasites. As if reading her mind, Brenda shot her a defiant look before turning back to Barb. "Ten years, and the magic is _definitely_ still there."

Sharon flashed a bright, toothy smile, the same one she'd been known to turn on Chief Pope and even, earlier in their acquaintance, Brenda herself. "It's definitely something, all right. Excuse me."

She practically tore away from the chief and ducked out of the conference room, ostensibly in search of the ladies' room. And if she happened to take a quick survey of the other offices on the way, well, anybody could get lost in a facility this bland; everything looked the same.

Brenda slipped into the bathroom as Sharon stood washing her hands at the sink. After checking beneath the stall doors to make sure they were alone, she murmured, "Anything?"

"Unsurprisingly, no. Neither of them has a great big bloody butcher's knife on his or her desk. Wonders never cease, though: apparently Wendy went to Stanford."

Pale golden eyebrows shot toward Brenda's hairline. "I wouldn't have pegged her as the type, that's for sure. And she sells real estate? - You didn't have to run off like that, you know. I almost had to tell Barb you had bladder control issues."

Sharon's eyes widened to alarming proportions. "You did _not_!"

"I said 'almost.' But I could have. You were actin' like your panties were on fire."

The captain winced at the turn of phrase. "Did you also have to call me by your cat's name?"

Brenda rolled her eyes. "It's a term of endearment."

"Well, _baby_, if you ever do it again, you won't have to worry about who the murderer is, because I'll suffocate you in your sleep," Sharon promised in a tone of exaggerated sweetness, leaning in very close to Brenda because she was unable to resist taunting her. Sharon waited for the other woman to turn away.

Brenda didn't flinch. Her dark eyes had tiny flecks of gold in them, and Sharon could feel her every exhalation against her own lips. Her breath smelled sweet, like the mid-range chablis they were serving out there.

"What would you prefer?" the blonde asked in a low, even voice. "Honey? Sweetheart?" Brenda's voice in that register was making Sharon's toes curl inside her pumps. The younger woman's eyes were fastened on hers, and Sharon couldn't bring herself to be the first to look away. "Darlin'? Baby?"

The moment was stretching out too long, too long, and Sharon felt a bubble of panic well up in her throat because she was very afraid that she was about to do something extremely stupid. She imagined Brenda calling her _baby_ and breathed out harshly, her eyelids drooping.

"How about Suzie Q?"

There it was again, that cold-water-in-the-face sensation. Taking a decisive step back, the captain yanked a paper towel from the dispenser, hastily dragged it over her hands, and tossed it vengefully into the trash can. "_Susan_ is more than adequate, _Jean_. How much longer do we have to stay?"

Brenda stood motionless for a few seconds, her lips slightly parted in surprise at the abrupt change both of subject and Sharon's demeanor. "We haven't learned anything yet," she managed.

"Maybe we're not going to." The older woman glanced at her reflection and fluffed her hair before marching toward the door and yanking it open. "Maybe this whole operation is just an elaborate waste of time."

Alone in the ladies' room, Brenda looked at her own reflection and swallowed hard. At least, she thought, feeling a little dazed, there was free booze. The Lord knew, with a knife-wielding murderer on the loose and Sharon acting as cuddly as a prickly pear, she'd need it.


	16. Chapter 16

**Title: Since You Went Away **

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Pairing: Brenda/Sharon**

**Rating: T (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 9721**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Dear readers, thank you again for your patience between postings. We've had a few unhappy comments about the length of time between each chapter, and unfortunately, that doesn't motivate us to write faster. However, it helps to know that most of you are still sticking with us while we have to do inconvenient real life things like graduating from grad school, writing a dissertation, and working at jobs. We hope that this chapter will have been worth the wait! Please let us know what you think - you know how we feel about comments!**

**Chapter Sixteen: Death Takes a Holiday**

Brenda was jostled from a deep slumber by the jarring, unfamiliar sensation of being touched. It had been so long since she had been caressed or held while she slept that she immediately tensed and opened her eyes, expecting a ski mask-wearing figure standing over the bed with a machete and a "God Hates Fags" sign. When her eyes adjusted to the dark, she saw that the bedroom was empty save herself and the sleeping form of her friend. She heaved a sigh of relief and slumped against the mattress, adrenalin whooshing out of her.

She'd been so ready to snatch up the gun hidden in her nightstand that the quietness was nearly a disappointment.

With the haziness of abruptly waking up beginning to clear, she remembered why she had been woken up in the first place: there was a hand somewhere on her person. She didn't have to lower her eyes to see that Sharon had palmed her breast; the first acknowledgement of the warmth of her fingertips spread like fire through Brenda's body, settling hot and pulsing between her legs.

She_ knew _that she should do something. The sensible part of her brain urged her to shift out from under Sharon's touch or to at least gently remove the woman's hand, but there was another part, a part that had been stifled and ignored for too long, that liked the way it felt.

Sharon was most assuredly asleep; over the past four days that they had been undercover, the captain had become increasingly agitated and fidgety, creating various ways to ignore the deputy chief's flirtatious remarks and putting greater and greater distances between them. She was surprised that Sharon hadn't moved to sleep on the sofa altogether and had been thoroughly confused by the unending mixed messages that the captain hurled her way.

No - if Sharon were awake, she would have been horrified to know that she had touched Brenda. So surely she would have been outright enraged and disgusted to know just how much Brenda was enjoying and encouraging it.

It was no secret that Brenda craved the touch of another human being. Her body had ached for forgotten pleasures. However, it was no longer the caress of a faceless lover that she desired but the touch of Sharon Raydor alone. She could not pinpoint when these fantasies had begun. After the club? After their first kiss or, perhaps, the second? Before they ever became friends and were simply antagonistic colleagues? There was no way for Brenda to know for certain. All she knew was that her body craved the brunette's thorough attention.

Her nipple instantly hardened as her mind began to wander, no doubt pressing into Sharon's palm like a pebble. Brenda closed her eyes, wondering what it would feel like if Sharon shifted just so and rubbed her thumb against it or, better yet, pinched and pulled and-

Sharon pulled back her hand and rolled onto her back.

Brenda stared in disbelief, waiting to see if Sharon had woken up. She watched the steady rise and fall of the other woman's chest and once again swallowed her anxiety, clamping her eyes tightly shut to the sight of her. Her body was humming with need, throbbing ceaselessly between her legs.

What was wrong with her? Surely it wasn't right to want to have sex with your best friend?

Brenda rolled to her side and clenched her thighs together, hoping that sleep would once again quickly claim her. Listening to the sound of Sharon's breathing, Brenda wished that it _had_ been the killer after all.

2.

Brenda Leigh was in the pool, swimming laps like her life depended on it, when the doorbell rang. Sharon unfolded herself from an inverted pose with a sigh, slowly stretched her arms above her head, and then tripped lightly toward the door. An unexpected guest would, at least, offer a distraction from the heavy mixture of boredom, anxiety, and frustration that had blanketed her for the past three days; but it seemed exceedingly unlikely that the murderer would ring the bell, so they were no closer to accomplishing anything that was actually useful. Rodney and Thomas had been settled into their new home for several months before they were attacked, although the recent deaths had occurred much more quickly after the couples had moved in. She envisioned being stuck in this house, which had begun to feel uncomfortably confining despite its enormous dimensions, with Brenda Johnson for months on end, and shuddered. It was enough to make her almost glad that Pope was practically foaming at the mouth to pull the plug on the undercover op.

Sharon tilted her chin slightly and smiled at the woman standing on the doorstep. Those who knew her would have recognized the smile as predatory. "Ms. Heller," she said. "What a nice surprise."

"Wendy, please." The captain wondered if the little blonde realized she was literally vibrating with nervous energy, bouncing in her bright crimson heels; Sharon doubted it was because she'd had an extra shot of espresso in her morning latte. "So sorry to disturb you, but I realized we still had your spare keys at the office, so I brought them by." As if this were show and tell, she held a distended envelope up beside her face, and accompanied it with a bright, sickly smile. Sharon stepped back instinctively, worried that the realtor was about to vomit on her bare feet.

"Please come in." Sharon opened the door several inches wider. "Would you like some coffee, or juice? Jean's in the pool, but she'll be so glad to see you. We don't know a soul out here yet," she continued with a confiding smile.

Wendy plucked at the skirt of her navy dress as she followed Sharon into the vast, open kitchen. "How wonderful, though, that the two of you have each other."

"Oh, yes," Sharon agreed breezily, pouring orange juice into two glasses. "I can't imagine my life without her in it." From outside came the sound of a splash, and Sharon's grip tightened on the pitcher. She realized she was being completely truthful, not acting a part at all, and took her time putting the juice away so the other woman wouldn't see the flush that had overspread her cheeks. "Are you married, Wendy?"

The younger woman blanched as she accepted the glass of juice. "I was."

"Oh, I'm sorry."

She smiled tightly. "So am I. - But that seems like another lifetime, now."

"How long have you been in real estate?"

Wendy visibly relaxed, her smile growing less strained and her posture softening. "Goodness, all my life. I started working for my uncle's firm when I was still in high school - just odds and ends, you know, filing - and I loved it." She dimpled. "I knew right away that it was what I wanted to do. As soon as I finished high school, I got my license. That's how I put myself through college, actually," she confessed with obvious pride.

Sharon's eyebrows rose. "You must have been quite the child prodigy, if you sold enough real estate to put yourself through Stanford."

Wendy sputtered a little as she swallowed a sip of her juice. "Oh, I just meant - with scholarships, you know, and -"

They were interrupted by the slamming of the side door and Brenda's voice loudly declaiming, "O Captain, my captain, our voyage is done! Our ship has weathered ev'ry rack, the -"

The captain in question clenched her teeth so hard that she was pretty sure she felt something crack. "Jean, sweetie, look who's here!"

Brenda had already halted, frozen by the sight of the realtor, her eyes widening, but she recovered herself quickly, swooping into the kitchen and leaning down to kiss Sharon's cheek. "Wendy!" she exclaimed. "So nice of you to come by. Suzie and I were just saying we're gettin' a little lonely out here all by ourselves."

"I brought your spare keys," the smaller blonde explained, and gulped the remainder of her juice like a frat boy in a beer-bonging competition. "Now, unfortunately, I have to be going. Houses to show." The nauseated smile was back.

"I'll walk you out," Brenda offered, oozing southern charm.

When she returned to the kitchen a few minutes later she found Sharon spooning yogurt onto a bowl of granola. Green eyes met brown.

"Good thing," Brenda began, "she didn't come out here to go into actin'. She's terrible."

"If that woman went to Stanford, I'm the Queen of Sheba," Sharon agreed.

The deputy chief nodded decisively. "I'll call Andy. I'd say Ms. Wendy Heller's just itchin' for a visit from the boys in blue."

3.

Sharon sat at the end of the sofa, legs curled beneath her while she rested the case file of Rodney Crowther on her lap. She'd read the dossier a dozen times and had spent hours staring at the crime scene photos, hoping that she would discover something-anything-that might give her some insight into why he had been killed. Each time she reviewed the case she found nothing she hadn't seen before and instead only fortified her resolve to find his murderer. Six days into the operation had yielded nothing but impatience and unanswered questions, but when she looked at his pale, lifeless face, she remembered why she was there.

If nothing else, going over the open files of each victim gave her something to think about that wasn't her housemate.

At present, the woman in question was clattering around in the kitchen, having offered to clean up after dinner. The captain knew without question that Brenda was becoming restless. She couldn't blame her, but the frisson of untempered energy was thick in the house, settling heavily on Sharon despite her best attempts at keeping busy.

It was slowly driving her insane.

She tapped her fingers against the rims of her glasses and closed the file, reaching instead for the file on the Millican-Crews. As she flipped through the case notes, she heard Brenda shuffle into the living room, dragging her feet in a juvenile display of exaggerated ennui.

When Sharon did not look up from her reading, Brenda slumped down onto the couch, dragging a case file into her lap with a heavy, burdensome sigh. Her fingers plucked at the pages in a way that would make the most amount of noise and her knee shook restlessly. When the captain still neglected to humor her, Brenda finally dropped the file back on the coffee table and whined, "Why won't somethin' just _happen?_"

"I'm assuming that's a rhetorical question."

Brenda leaned her head back against the cushions and looked at Sharon. "Yeah. I just...isn't this waitin' makin' your skin crawl?"

"It is, but complaining about it isn't going to expedite the timeline of events that we're not even sure will happen."

"I've got Will breathin' down my neck and the boys have come up with squat...I mean, what're they doin' over there? Havin' a party?" She huffed again, shaking her knee more quickly. "I'm about ready to arrest everyone and call it a day."

"I understand your frustration, Brenda, but you have got to calm down. You're going to make _me_ crazy, and you won't like me when I'm crazy."

Brenda smirked, raising a suggestive eyebrow. "Who knows...could be fun..."

Sharon rolled her eyes. "You need to relax. Go take a hot shower, paint your toenails, and stop distracting me."

"Why captain, is that an order?"

"It is if it will get you out of my hair."

"I bet Jean's the one who calls the shots in the relationship," Brenda guessed, getting to her feet. "I'll just bet that she has Susan wrapped around her finger."

Sharon snorted. "So why is Jean the one rushing off to do as Susan told her?"

Brenda pursed her lips. "I was gonna shower anyway."

"Uh huh. Whatever you say."

The blonde hovered, leaning over Sharon's shoulder at the arm of the couch to look at the file. "Are you actually gettin' anything new out of these files?"

"I'm certainly trying. Now _go_. Relax. Have fun."

"Aye, captain!"

When the sound of Brenda's feet padding up the stairs faded and the shower was turned on, Sharon let out a sigh of relief. She pressed her cold knuckles to her warm cheek and closed her eyes, willing her mind to focus instead on the connection between Rodney and Thomas and the other victims rather than the naked form of her friend upstairs. She clearly pictured the steam fogging the mirror as the blonde shed her clothes, allowing them to pool at her feet as she stepped into the scalding stream of water.

Sharon gulped and opened her eyes, fixing them to a bloody snapshot of Deborah Millican-Crew. She'd seen the photo so many times that she'd become desensitized to it, the stark spray of blood no longer evoking the queasy somberness she generally felt. She gave up on her work and stacked the files on the coffee table. There was no way that she could concentrate.

It was easy to blame Brenda's restlessness for distracting her, but Sharon knew that it was Brenda herself who was the distraction. It was nothing she did to provoke a reaction; it was simply the fact that she was _Brenda Leigh_, incomprehensibly beautiful and effortlessly sexy.

Sharon stood with a groan, setting her glasses atop the files so that she could rub at her weary eyes. Her mind screamed for a distraction that would not leave her body tingling with unspent need and she remembered the handful of DVDs that Brenda had brought.

What better to distract her than a mind-numbing movie?

Recalling that Brenda had left the DVDs in their bedroom, Sharon swiftly climbed the stairs, hoping to come and go before Brenda had finished in the shower so that she would not be confronted by the sight of the slender woman, damp and naked except for a towel...

In their bedroom, Sharon quickly found the box of miscellaneous items that the other woman had brought with her: CDs, books, and a variety of other random items that the captain knew Brenda would never use. As she reached the bottom of the box where the movies were stacked, an unmistakable sound from the ensuite bathroom ensnared Sharon's attention so fully that she couldn't move.

A moan: a stifled, high-pitched moan of pleasure.

Blood rushed to Sharon's face and green eyes widened. There was no way that the moan could be attributed to anything but the fact that Brenda was touching herself.

Sharon found herself assaulted by startling imagery, her mind piecing together the picture of the deputy chief's hand lodged between her thighs, rubbing herself to satisfaction. Was her head thrown back in pleasure? Was her free hand bracing against the tiled wall for support, or was she putting it to use, cupping one exquisitely shaped breast with needy urgency?

Her throat was dry. She needed water or, better yet, a cold shower of her own to wipe away the forbidden thoughts that she never wanted to have about her best friend. She pulled her hand out of the box, forgetting completely what she had been in search of, and rose to stand on unsteady legs. Her ears strained for any repetition of the moan but, hearing nothing, Sharon concluded that the other woman had obviously not intended to be loud enough to be overheard. Was Brenda muffling her cries with her hand or biting her lip? Was that moan the conclusion of her act or was it merely the beginning?

She pressed her cold hand to her throat and drifted toward the hallway, pausing momentarily to look back at the door of the bathroom. She had told Brenda to have fun, to relax. She had, for all intents and purposes, encouraged her to masturbate.

Had the same thought occurred to the deputy chief? If it had, did thoughts of Sharon linger in her mind when she slipped her long fingers between her folds?

Sharon scolded herself as she quietly crept back downstairs, careful to avoid the stair that creaked. She could not be thinking about what Brenda would look like when she came. She could not be humoring thoughts of climbing into the shower with Brenda and replacing the younger woman's hand with her own.

She collapsed onto the couch and buried her face in her hands. She couldn't do this. She had a job to do and a friendship to maintain; both of these things were far too important to throw away for something as pointless as sex.

It had to stop.

4.

Sharon wasn't all that surprised to find Chief Pope standing on the doorstep when the bell rang early that evening. She was slightly more taken aback by his attire: an unmistakable brown and yellow uniform, complete with knee-length shorts. He carried a large box, and intoned "Delivery" through gritted teeth.

She smirked even as she stepped back to allow the man to enter.

When she'd come inside earlier from a good hour and a half spent playing in Jean Hennessey's cedar mulch (because she figured it was best that she stay as far away from Brenda Leigh as possible while her body calmed down and she talked herself back to sanity, and at least planting nasturtiums someone would surely later dig up gave her the illusion of productivity), the blonde had been sprawled on the sofa, her attention focused on the laptop resting on the glass-topped coffee table. She'd immediately turned it so the captain could see the photo on the screen.

A tan blonde in a pink tank-top grinned over the top of an oversized, umbrella-topped drink that was most assuredly of the fruity persuasion. There was a palm tree in the background.

"Meet Wendy Heller," Brenda had said grandly.

"I've met her." Sharon frowned. "I'm not that impressed."

"You haven't, actually."

The brunette looked down and wiped a bit of excess dirt from her knees, and then turned back to the screen. "Why are we looking at photos of Wendy on vacation in Cabo?"

"Costa Rica, actually. And she's not on vacation; she lives there. Has done since 2008."

"You mean -"

"Yup." Brenda grinned, her eyes bright and keen like those of a bloodhound following a scent. "Wendy Heller is not Wendy Heller."

Sharon shook her head. "How did we not know she had a twin?"

"Yeah, how come you didn't know? Can't you all recognize each other, like the masons?" Brenda teased. "We didn't know because their biological mother gave them up at birth. They were both adopted. The real Wendy Heller grew up in Washington State and went to Stanford. Her twin, Tricia Mangum, grew up in Iowa, and didn't move to California until last year."

"My head hurts."

"This is the easy part. - Wendy - that is, Tricia - cracked like an egg when the boys picked her up and questioned her."

"Shocking," Sharon interrupted dryly. "She seemed so cool under pressure."

"Tricia met Wendy for the first time in 2008. Wendy just showed up on her doorstep in Des Moines. Her adoptive mother had told her on her deathbed that she had a sister, blah blah blah. According to Tricia, Wendy told her she was moving away to start a new life, but wanted to meet her first, because it would be the only time they could ever have any contact."

"I call shenanigans."

Brenda's eyebrows rose in surprise at her friend's flippant comment, and Sharon smirked. "It's something the kids always said. Do we know why Wendy decided to flee the country?" Her eyes narrowed suddenly, all traces of humor disappearing from her countenance. "2008 - Thomas and Rodney were killed in 2008. In January."

"Wendy told Tricia that she'd gone through a horrible break-up and was afraid of her ex."

"So she changed her name and moved to _Costa Rica_ to get away from him? Personally I would've just taken out a restraining order."

Brenda's smirk was a fair imitation of the older woman's habitual expression. "What if your ex was so angry that he was goin' around killin' people to get back at you?"

"Then I might move to Costa Rica. But I fail to see what this has to do with Rodney and Thomas, or with our other victims."

"I fail to see that too." Brenda whipped off her reading glasses, put them down on the table, and rubbed hard at the bridge of her nose. "But they _have_ to be connected."

The two women had sat in silence for several minutes, both thinking furiously.

"All right," Sharon began finally. "Okay. So Tricia turned up here as Wendy last year -"

"In July," Brenda supplied. "Havin' already arranged to go into partnership with Blake Manley. She'd been livin' in, get this, Chicago for two years, sellin' real estate, since leavin' Des Moines."

"As Wendy?" When the blonde nodded, Sharon asked the glaringly obvious question: "_Why?_"

Brenda Leigh snorted out a laugh and rolled her eyes. "Tax evasion. Tricia Mangum owes the IRS over $200,000.00."

"How convenient, then, that she has a twin sister whose identity she was able to steal."

"Wendy wasn't usin' it," the chief agreed calmly.

"So our homosexual-hating slasher is doing all this because, what, Wendy scorned him?" Sharon shook her head, perplexed. "The timeline makes sense: 'Wendy' comes back to Los Angeles, and the murders resume right where they left off."

"But why not just kill her? Why drag all these innocent people into it?"

"Brenda Leigh, does the word 'psychopath' mean anything to you?" The captain stood and began to pace behind the sofa, running the fingers of both hands through her long, loose hair. "Maybe he still loves her."

"Great way of showin' it," Brenda had said, and then her phone had rung.

From her end of the conversation, Sharon very quickly gleaned that Pope wanted to shut down the undercover operation.

"A suspect in custody?" the deputy chief had howled. "Yeah, we've got Tricia Mangum, alias Wendy Heller, in custody, but I don't suspect her of anything more than bein' an _idiot_. There is no way she attacked eight people with a butcher knife, never mind the fact that she logistically couldn't have committed the first murders because she was in Iowa at the time. If you close us down now, we won't have any way of findin' the killer until he makes a mistake. Do you really want to stand back and watch while the bodies of L.A.'s gay and lesbian community stack up?"

Pope was there now spoiling for a fight, but her first glimpse of him told the captain which way the wind was blowing. If he was really determined to pull her and Brenda out, he wouldn't have played along by showing up dressed as the FedEx guy, never mind his grumbling about the insistence of Provenza and Tao; he would've just driven over as himself in his own vehicle. In fact, if he were really serious about terminating the op, he wouldn't have come at all; he would've simply issued an order. Even Brenda Leigh had to comply with direct orders from the acting chief of police.

The captain, therefore, was fairly unconcerned. She popped herself some popcorn, poured a glass of tea, and sat down unobtrusively in a corner of the sprawling living room to watch the rest of the show.

Brenda had obviously reached the same conclusion as Sharon. She stopped herself mid-rant and abruptly demanded, "Will, why did you even come over here?" Before he could answer she interrupted, "I mean, why did you _really_ come? Did you want to see the deputy chief and the captain in action, hmm?" In a flash she was at Sharon's side, draped insinuatingly over the other woman's shoulder as she reached to help herself to a few kernels of popcorn. "Did you want to see how domestic we are, what a convincin' couple? What do you say, Suzie Q - wanna put on a show for the chief, here?"

Part of Sharon was absolutely infuriated with Brenda for playing this game. The other part - about thirty percent - couldn't help feeling incredibly smug as she noted how Pope's eyes flicked from Brenda's decolletage to her own bare legs, and how his adam's apple bobbed and the tips of his ears turned bright pink.

"Fine," he snapped. "Fine, you can stay through the weekend, but that's absolutely it. I expect to see you both in the office Monday morning."

Brenda smiled again then, once more all Southern graciousness. "I'll walk you to the door. - Is there really anythin' in that box?"

Sharon popped another kernel into her mouth, but it stuck to her tongue, which suddenly felt dry. For once she completely agreed with Chief Johnson that staying under cover as Susan and Jean Hennessey was absolutely the right thing to do, professionally speaking. She owed it not just to Rodney and Thomas, but to the other six victims, to herself, to the entire city of Los Angeles, to do everything in her power to find this maniac with a knife fetish.

Still, she couldn't deny that, personally, she wished Pope had pulled the plug and sent them straight home.

5.

The following evening, Brenda found herself standing amidst the large, sparklingly clean kitchen, wondering when this had all stopped being fun. She had a feeling that she just couldn't shake, the sort of odd, uneasy feeling she had whenever something was about to happen. She'd resolved herself to the fact that their undercover op was a bust and had hoped, despite her irritation over ending up with an unclosed case, that knowing they'd be returning to their regularly hectic lives as Deputy Chief Johnson and Captain Raydor would spark a renewal of normalcy between them. However, despite her best attempts at keeping things light, Sharon was as distant and reticent as ever. It was more than the reservation she maintained as part of her general disposition; Brenda was certain, the way she was certain about a suspect's guilt, that Sharon was going out of her way to put distance between them.

Brenda looked out of the kitchen window, catching a glimpse at Sharon's bare, unpainted toes where she was sprawled out along one of the patio chairs. The evening's cool breeze drifted in through the screen, caressing the blonde's bare arms invitingly.

Making up her mind, Brenda took down two wine glasses and opened a bottle of Sharon's favorite Riesling, pouring some for each of them. The feeling in her stomach tightened as she neared the patio door. She took a fortifying breath to calm her nerves, reminding herself that nothing would ever happen (whether it be good or bad) if she hid in the kitchen and allowed Sharon to wallow in whatever it was that was eating her.

She carefully balanced the two glasses as she stepped outside, closing the screen door behind her. "Beautiful evening," she remarked, looking out over the pinkish-purple sunset over the canyon.

"Yes," Sharon replied, the green hue of her eyes intensified by the colors reflected in them. The glow that was cast upon her face by the vibrant evening sky was breathtaking and Brenda's chest warmed pleasantly at the sight of it.

"Brought you somethin'." The deputy chief held out the wine glass, relieved that Sharon smiled and thanked her when she reached up to accept it. Feeling more at ease, Brenda sat down on the empty chair beside her. "I can't get over this sunset." It wasn't a lie, exactly-but the way the pink tones bled into red was nothing compared to the peaceful expression on her friend's face.

"Mmm," Sharon agreed. "It's too bad Jean and Susan can't see it."

"They will soon enough...when this mess is all over, anyway."

"If we catch our killer. If not..." Her voice trailed off and she shook her head. "It would be a shame if they missed out on this. I'd hate to think that this beautiful view might go to waste."

"Hey...it's not a waste right now, is it?" Brenda cradled the wine glass against her stomach and looked over at Sharon. "We're sharin' it with each other."

The captain was reflective for a moment before she turned to Brenda and smiled serenely. "We are." She held the younger woman's gaze before looking back at the horizon, watching the sun dip lower beneath the clouds.

It would be dark soon and then it would be time for bed. The knot in Brenda's stomach intensified once again. She'd secretly loved sharing the bed with her closest friend. It had been a comfort to her; it had shocked her to have the tiny presence of her kitten remind her just how much she hated to sleep alone. To lose that for an unknown period of time would have been awful...if she hadn't had Sharon as her replacement.

As far as bedmates went, Sharon was...different. When they'd slept together before, it had been about comfort and companionship. That closeness that they had since shared as friends was gone, replaced now by awkward tension and a growing distance that scared the hell out of Brenda. Had the kissing ruined things? She vividly recalled the talk they'd had about the importance of their friendship. What had changed? It certainly wasn't Brenda. She had been as constant as the North Star-aside from the fact that her attraction to Sharon had grown considerably. For Brenda, however, her attraction only enhanced what she felt for Sharon as a friend. If nothing had changed on her part, what had?

"I wonder what they would be doing right now," Sharon mused after she took a sip of her wine. "Susan and Jean, I mean."

Brenda smiled. "Maybe they'd be doin' exactly this."

"Or maybe Jean would be doing the taxes and Susan would be cleaning out the fridge."

"Maybe they'd be takin' a swim."

"Maybe they'd be fighting."

"Or maybe," Brenda said, lowering her voice slightly, "they'd be makin' love."

Sharon swallowed. "Who knows."

"It's a beautiful night for love makin'," Brenda continued, the twilight darkening Sharon's features only a little, allowing her to see the flush of color on her neck. "Maybe they'd be sittin' out here, talkin' over wine...and maybe Jean would have looked over at Susan and told her how she's never, ever seen anyone or anythin' so beautiful..." Sharon tilted her head, meeting her gaze through hooded eyelids. "And Suzie would blush and Jean would brush aside her hair and tell her that after all this time, she's never known anyone who could make her feel the way she does." Brenda hesitated for a moment and, with tentative fingers, caressed her fingertips across Sharon's brow, tucking an errant lock of brown hair behind her ear. "I bet Jeanie'd kiss her then, 'cause she wouldn't be able to think clearly 'til she did. It would be one of those long, slow kisses...the kind with tongue...the kind that makes your toes curl...and Susan would tell her to take her upstairs and make love to her 'til the crickets sing."

Sharon stared, cheeks red and eyes clouded with something Brenda vaguely recognized, before she blinked and set down her glass. She sat up and rubbed her temples, her hair curtaining her face from Brenda's view.

Concerned, Brenda leaned forward and touched her hand to Sharon's arm. "Sharon? What's wrong?"

"That's right: I'm Sharon," the brunette replied, her tone hard.

"What in heaven's name has gotten into you?"

"Whatever it is that you're doing," Sharon snapped as she got to her feet, "has to stop. Now."

"I'm not doin' anything," Brenda bit back defensively.

"I don't want to play this game anymore, Brenda Leigh."

Brenda blinked in confusion at the other woman, wondering if it would be uncalled for to physically shake some sense into her. "What game? What the hell are you talkin' about?"

Sharon snorted. "That's exactly my point. You don't even know what you're doing." She crossed her arms over her chest and looked back at her friend, though it was almost dark enough that Brenda couldn't make out the cool, icy look on her face. "I'd like to be alone," Sharon finally stated, turning on her heel. She stalked away toward the pool and sat down on the edge, dipping her feet inside while Brenda stared intently at her back.

The blonde slumped against her chair, blinking up at the twinkling stars in the sky. She was completely at a loss. The telling knot in her belly swelled to uncomfortable proportions. She couldn't remember the last time she felt like this or how to make it better. She couldn't even talk to her best friend about it.

Brenda got to her feet and watched Sharon for several more minutes, hoping the woman would turn back to look at her. When she could barely make out her silhouette in the dark, Brenda took up the two wine glasses and went inside, deciding that she would shower and go to bed early.

6.

A small, shivering, tinkling sound from inside the house roused Sharon. She realized how dark it was. She realized the soft pads of her toes were shrivelled from their long immersion in the water.

She realized someone was moving through the darkened house, creeping through the ground floor. Brenda Leigh Johnson did many things, but she certainly didn't creep.

Moving as quietly and stealthily as she could, Sharon darted back to the house and eased the sliding glass door open. The tile floor felt icy cold beneath her damp, bare feet; her ears pricked, strained the way Manzana's did when she heard something that set all her little feline senses on alert. Around her she heard only silence. It was a silence that breathed, that pulsed with a heartbeat that wasn't her own. Further away, upstairs and a world away, she heard the faintest patter of water falling in the shower.

Well, she'd wanted something to distract her while Brenda showered, hadn't she?

They were standing on opposite sides of the wall, Sharon and the intruder, inches apart. The captain heard the drawing of a single harsh, shaky breath.

Sharon reached out and flipped on the kitchen light. If her would-be assailant was startled by the sudden illumination, she - because the diminutive figure was certainly that of a woman - was completely taken aback by the older woman's calm demeanor as she faced her.

"You're early," Sharon said in her most even Captain Raydor voice. "You must've known we'd still be awake."

The woman gazed at Sharon with wide, glassy eyes, as if the captain were the one loosely but comfortably gripping a suitably wicked-looking knife. "You were expecting me?" she asked in a tone of wonder, her cheeks pinkening slightly as if she were - flattered?

Had it not been for the knife, the younger woman would've looked like she couldn't hurt a fly. Pale and slight, her caramel-colored skin sallow, those glassy eyes burning with a feverish heat, she looked - no, the captain decided, not quite like one of the junkies down on the Boulevard. This fever was caused by something else.

"Yes," Sharon finally answered her. "We've been expecting you."

The smaller woman licked her lips. "Yes," she muttered. "Yes, it's a great work. I am the instrument."

Oh, that ticked the box, then: right-wing religious mania. Sharon was instantly disappointed. It was so pedestrian, so futile, such a waste. The captain would bet that she knew her bible a good bit better than this young woman did; but this wasn't really the time for a theological discussion.

There had to be more to it than that.

"Why us?" Sharon asked, politely curious, in the same tone in which she might have asked if the other woman wanted a glass of water.

"You revel in your sin. The wrath of the Lord must be visited upon the unclean, as an example to others."

Sharon blinked a single time. "Right," she said, and wondered if Brenda planned to emerge from the shower some time this century. "What about you, though? Is this your punishment, for what you were?"

Her grip on the knife tightened. "I am the instrument. I atone."

"What about Wendy?" The taller woman continued to speak coolly, keeping the weapon in her peripheral vision. Yoga kept her in very good shape, but she wasn't confident she'd be able to wrestle that knife away from the other woman in a tussle without inflicting some serious damage on both of them. _Damn it, Brenda, something's finally happening, and you're missing it! If you're up there getting off again, I'll _kill_ you._

If she didn't get herself killed first, of course. This was a lovely house, but not so lovely that Sharon relished the thought of bleeding out on the kitchen floor.

"You love Wendy, don't you?"

For a few seconds Sharon thought she'd misstepped by mentioning Wendy Heller. The other woman's entire body trembled as if with a kind of frenzy - but her grip on the knife only tightened again.

"I love Wendy," the younger woman agreed. "And Wendy loves me."

"Wendy is afraid of you," Sharon replied, steadily meeting those dark eyes. "She knew you killed Rodney Crowther and Thomas Rios, didn't she? - What's your name?" the captain asked suddenly.

The other woman blinked, surprised, but answered in that same hollow, dreamy tone. "Jacqueline."

"Jacqueline, Rodney Crowther was my friend. He was a kind, lovely man. What did he or Thomas ever do to you?"

Sharon heard her own voice, like that of a teacher chastising a naughty pupil, and knew she should shut up, but she couldn't. It didn't make any sense; she needed to understand why, why the two of them, who'd had absolutely nothing to do with Wendy Heller.

Jacqueline's impossibly wide eyes had widened further. "You were there," she said now. "You - you had on a black dress. And pretty hair. I used to have pretty hair."

Sharon owned a lot of black dresses, and wore them frequently; but now she remembered Jacqueline. "You work for the catering company," she said. "You were at the mixer. And at Thomas and Rodney's housewarming?" She released a single sharp, dry chuckle. "You're not on a mission, Jacqueline. You're mad because your girlfriend broke up with you."

_Shit_, she thought as the knife blade landed against her carotid artery and one of Jacqueline's surprisingly strong arms went around her waist. This was a fine time for the reserved captain suddenly to develop an inability to keep her mouth shut; but that tended to happen when she was disgusted and infuriated.

"You don't know anything about Wendy or me, you filthy cunt."

Sharon felt a fleck of Jacqueline's spittle against her cheek. People always talked about steel being cold; against her skin it felt hot and seemed to tingle. _Nice language_, she reflected, _for the Lord's avenging instrument._

"I know that Wendy was so afraid of you that she gave up her entire life and left the country." Talking made the blade dig into her flesh. It was a fascinating, unpleasant sensation.

"But she came back because she loves me. She doesn't see yet, but she will. She'll understand our work. I'll save her."

"You're gonna save her by murderin' a whole bunch of innocent people? It's been a while since I went to Sunday school, but I don't remember the part where Jesus said that."

_Finally_, Sharon thought. Brenda Leigh really was late to everything. She'd probably been shampooing her hair and shaving her legs.

"You're not innocent!" Jacqueline shrieked. "You're vile, disgusting sinners, and God will punish you!" The knife blade dug into Sharon's flesh, and the sting was enough to make her wince.

Stepping into the kitchen, Brenda pursed her lips. "What we _are_ is LAPD." She calmly stepped close enough to press the barrel of her glock to Jacqueline's temple. It was an impressive sight: Brenda with her blonde curls dripping all over the place, stark naked save the blue towel cinched around her torso, pointing her service weapon as nonchalantly as if this were just another session at the firing range. "And you brought a knife to a gunfight."

For someone going around cheerfully murdering sinners for the greater good of humanity, Jacqueline was singularly unwilling to die herself. Sharon reached up and removed the long-handled knife from her unresisting fingers.

From beneath the towel Brenda produced a pair of cuffs, and Sharon decided not to think about where the deputy chief had been hiding them. Her chocolate eyes flicked to Sharon's green ones. "I've always wanted to say that," she admitted. "Makes me feel like John Wayne."

7.

It would have been easy to succumb to the exhaustion that was beginning to set in now that the chaos following Jacqueline's arrest had ended, but Sharon would not give her body the satisfaction it craved. When her adrenaline high had finally crashed, she felt the full brunt of tense muscles and frayed nerves and achingly longed for her own bathtub in her own house. _Soon_, she promised herself as she lugged out her suitcase.

While Brenda dealt with the remaining stragglers downstairs-namely a few black and whites and Chief Pope, who was undeniably pleased that the killer had managed to show up before he closed the operation _and_ that Brenda had not been the one in imminent danger-Sharon had retreated into the seclusion of the house's second floor. Though her body ached for the comfort of their bed, Sharon could not allow herself to lay down even for a brief repose. She couldn't spend another night in this house, lying beside the woman who had pushed her headfirst into an uncharacteristic tantrum and had still managed to come to her rescue.

Sharon had caught the woman who murdered her colleague. She had closed the case and was able to honor his memory by putting the crazed religious zealot behind bars. She had almost been killed, had almost met the same fate as Rodney. Still, despite all of these perfectly legitimate reasons for being on edge, it was Brenda Leigh who stole her attention and her sanity.

It was Brenda that she needed, and so it was Brenda that she denied herself.

Sharon began emptying drawers, neatly stacking her clothes in the suitcase. She heard the final car parked outside drive off and took a deep breath, bracing herself for Brenda's imminent presence.

"You don't waste any time, do you?" Brenda said, standing in the doorway. Sharon hadn't even heard her come up the stairs. "Are you that antsy to get away from me?"

"It's been a long week, Brenda," Sharon replied, refolding a black sweater before placing it in the suitcase. "It would be nice to give Jean and Susan their house, don't you think?"

Brenda rolled her eyes. "At one in the mornin'? I don't think so." She stepped inside the room, her hands lazily tucked into the back pockets of the jeans she'd managed to slip on before the uniforms arrived. Her ponytail bobbed as she tilted her head, ardently watching the captain as she stuffed her socks into one of the suitcase's compartments. Sharon avoided her gaze until the other woman gasped. "Sharon...you're bleedin'!"

Sharon's fingers instinctively touched the small cut on her neck. The blood had dried, its flaky remnants a startling reminder of how very real that knife had been. She shuddered.

Brenda grabbed a tissue and crossed the room, tilting the other woman's shoulders until Sharon was facing her. When her fingertips brushed the pale, elegant line of Sharon's neck, the captain jumped and snatched the tissue from her hands. "Don't. I'm fine. It's just a scratch."

"Why didn't you have someone take a look at that?" Brenda demanded hotly, hands on her hips. She watched as Sharon put some distance between them.

"I was a little preoccupied with getting an assailant into custody," Sharon said dismissively. "I forgot about it. But it's fine. I'm fine."

"You're not fine," Brenda snapped, and Sharon knew she was right. "You taunted an armed woman! Do you have any idea how stupid that was? How reckless?"

"I was unarmed, Brenda. What would you have had me do?"

"You coulda screamed, for starters! Alerted me somehow that she was in the house!"

"It wasn't worth the risk. She was unstable and had a knife. I knew you'd show up eventually."

Brenda exhaled sharply, pressing her hands to her forehead. "Sharon, you could have died!"

"But I didn't."

Brown eyes filled with tears. "But you could have. My God, Sharon...you coulda been killed while I was washin' my hair and I wouldn't have known till I came down to see if you were still mad at me." She let out a sound that was part-laugh, part-sob. Brenda bit her lip and launched herself at Sharon, wrapping her arms around her neck. She hugged her tightly and hid her face in Sharon's shoulder.

Sharon blinked, dizzy now from Brenda's rapid shift in emotions. When she felt a stray tear hit her neck, she registered how badly the younger woman was shaking. Reflexively, Sharon curled her arms around Brenda's waist. "Hey...it's okay. I'm still here, thanks to you."

"But you might not have been!" Brenda gasped, her voice muffled by Sharon's throat. "You can't ever do that again, _ever_!" She pulled back far enough to see Sharon's face, her hands tightly gripping her shoulders. "D'you hear me?"

"I did my job, Brenda. You can't tell me that you wouldn't have done exactly the same thing in my position."

The blonde pursed her lips in quiet contemplation. "That doesn't matter. It wasn't me in that position."

Sharon chuckled. "You and your double standards. Listen-I'm all right. It's over now."

"Is it?" Brenda pulled away, her face reluctant as she slipped out of Sharon's grasp. "We're not all right, are we? Whatever happened earlier...it's not better, is it?"

"No, it's not."

"Will you tell me what's goin' on? You could've been killed tonight and you're too important to me to just let you go off bein' mad when I have no idea why. Let me at least have the chance to fix it."

The taller woman's response was a small, pained smile. "You want to fix it," she echoed. "That's - I wish you could."

Brenda's heart gave a single hard leap. "You're scarin' me," she admitted with trepidation. She watched as Sharon turned to look out the window, but instead of seeing into the darkness, the captain was confronted with her own reflection and, behind her, Brenda with her hands clasped anxiously in front of her abdomen.

Sharon ran her fingers through her hair and sighed before turning back to face her friend. "I'm not upset with you, Brenda Leigh. With myself, yes. And I'm -" She breathed deeply again and looked around the large, airy bedroom as if searching for the words. "Envious," she finally concluded very quietly, and chuckled without humor.

Brenda's forehead knitted in confusion. It was silent, with not even the ticking of a clock to distract them. "Of?" she asked at last.

"Jean and Susan." Sharon shook her head and reached up to rub at the back of her neck, her smile rueful, self-deprecating. "The way we imagined them, here, together, in this house."

The younger woman drew a quick, harsh breath through her nostrils. She was wary of speaking, moving, even breathing too loudly and interrupting. She was afraid Sharon would stop if she did, and Brenda knew with instinctive certainty that what the captain was about to say was going to be something she needed to hear.

"This is a nice house," Sharon resumed more conversationally, folding her arms protectively over her chest. "Nice pool, nice view, nice stainless-steel refrigerator. It's not exactly my taste, but it's lovely. It was fun to play with it all for a few days, like being on vacation."

Brenda swallowed nervously and thought that if the tension and anxiety of the past week had felt like a vacation to Sharon, then the other woman was obviously in dire need of a _real_ vacation.

"That's the thing about a vacation, though: it's not real life. It's just temporary. It's a fantasy, a narrative you create for yourself. If it were permanent, it would be about remembering to renew the car insurance and taking out the trash and arguing over who spilled wine on the carpet."

Sharon looked down, her long hair screening her expression from Brenda's view. "But the fantasy was really appealing," she admitted even more softly. "It would've been nice to be Susan Hennessey for a little while."

The blonde quickly licked her lips before speaking. "I know what you mean," she said, her voice as soft as Sharon's. "It'd be nice to be somebody else sometimes. It'd be nice to have a partner, not to be alone."

Soft green eyes steadily met Brenda's dark ones. "You do know what I mean," the older woman agreed after several seconds of careful study. "And you know that's not it." Despite herself she stepped closer to her lovely, skittish friend, and felt herself reaching out to twine her fingers with the other woman's. She felt the slide of a warm, slightly damp palm against her own. "This evening by the pool, drinking wine, admiring the sunset with you - Brenda Leigh, you made me want to be Susan. You did that on purpose."

Brenda's fingers trembled against Sharon's and then tightened convulsively. "Yes," she agreed roughly, as if her mouth had gone dry.

Sharon's voice had dropped to a low rumble, her eyes darkening to match. "Did you want to be Jean?"

The smaller woman nodded quickly, fairly certain that the power of speech had deserted her. Sharon's tongue automatically moistened lips that suddenly felt too dry, almost chapped, and the way Brenda's gaze zeroed in hungrily on the movement made the older woman's heart pound like a trip-hammer. When, Sharon wondered dimly, had they moved? Had she moved, or had Brenda? They were standing much closer now, close enough that their breasts almost brushed and she could feel the blonde's quick, excited breathing on her cheek, spurring her on.

"Wh - what," Brenda stammered as if the words were being yanked from her in short, sharp jerks, "would she have done? Susan?"

"What they both wanted."

Sharon's voice was still smoother and steadier than hers, the words almost breathed against Brenda's lips. Sharon gazed at her from beneath long, thick eyelashes, and Brenda's heart pounded as fast and lightly as a hummingbird's. _Please_, she thought. _Please_.

Brenda's eyes closed in what Sharon immediately recognized as surrender and anticipation. Sharon began to shake with a deep-rooted tremor that seemed to originate at the center of her being, as if all that centered energy built up over years of yoga was dying to burst out.

She held her breath as her lips very lightly skimmed Brenda's for the briefest of half-seconds. The younger woman held perfectly still, waiting, her fingers strangling Sharon's.

Experimentally, Sharon softly, chastely pressed her lips to Brenda's again, and felt Brenda's mouth move subtly, conforming to hers and clinging.

A violent shudder ran through Sharon from the soles of her feet to the crown of her head, and her free hand grabbed at the other woman's upper arm and clutched. Her mouth moved gently, not needing her dazed, petrified brain to tell her what it needed to do. Each heartbeat seemed to dilate, each second to crystallize and lengthen until she felt a sharp, piercing, ecstatic pain. There was such softness, such incredible softness, and so much of it that it scared her.

Brenda's breath hitched. Sharon tasted it, and then pushed forward to taste her, opening her own mouth and then nudging the other woman's lips apart so they could feel, breathe, taste each other. Brenda's arms, slender and strong, went around her when their open mouths melded together. The kiss remained gentle, as if they were holding something fragile between them, something incredibly delicate that they'd both promised to shelter and protect. They trembled together like leaves in a fierce spring rain storm.

Sharon finally eased them apart and back down. She kept her eyes closed tightly, at last disengaging from Brenda and curling her fingers into tight fists.

"Sharon?"

She opened her eyes as if it hurt her. "Yes," she said quietly. "I'm still Sharon."

Brenda blinked dazedly, her lips pink and wet and undeniably alluring. "I know you are. I don't want you to be anyone else." She let out a little breathless laugh. "That was..."

Sharon turned away. She couldn't bear to look at her anymore, feeling the way she had when she was a child staring up at the sun for too long. She glanced wistfully down at the carpet. "They have it good, don't they?"

"Huh?"

"Jean and Susan."

"I guess they do," Brenda said softly, and Sharon cringed. "But I wasn't Jean kissin' Susan." She took a step up behind her and Sharon could almost see her hesitating about putting a hand on her shoulder. "I was Brenda kissin' Sharon..." Her fingertips settled on Sharon's upper arm; her grip was unsure, as if she were waiting for Sharon to turn around and bite her.

"It was pretend, Brenda. That's the point: all of this was pretend."

"Sharon Raydor." Brenda's voice was firm, entirely no-nonsense. She sounded not like Brenda but like Deputy Chief Johnson, lacing her tone with enough intimidation to rattle Sharon's already frayed nerves. Brenda's hands were no longer trembling when she gripped Sharon's shoulders and turned her around, carefully directing her backward until she was sitting on the edge of the bed. "Do you really think that none of this would have happened if we hadn't had this undercover case?"

Sharon pursed her lips and considered the question. By the look of Brenda's raised eyebrow, she clearly expected an answer. "No, it wouldn't."

Brenda rolled her eyes. "Yes, Sharon, it would have. This house was just a pressure cooker." She sat down beside her, nudging away the suitcase with her hip. "We'd have ended up in this exact same position one way or another." She took up Sharon's hand in her own. "I wanted it to happen. Me, _Brenda_, not Jean. Did you want it too?"

Sharon let out a slow breath as she studied the way her hand fit with Brenda's. The insistence in the blonde's voice was so raw, so desperate that Sharon felt her stomach tighten. It would be so easy to say that she wanted it to happen-but it wasn't as simple as two people kissing whenever they felt like it. It was their work, their friendship, their _lives_-what position was Sharon in to add to the complication of what they could be without knowing if it was something she even wanted? She licked her lips. "It doesn't come down to such a black and white explanation, Brenda. I wanted to kiss you-" her voice shook when Brenda squeezed her hand "-but whatever this is that's happening between us...it's going to complicate things."

"Our relationship is already complicated," Brenda simply replied. "_Life_ is complicated."

Sharon rolled her eyes. "It's easy for you not to take this seriously-"

"I am takin' this very seriously." With her free hand, Brenda brushed back a loose strand of blonde hair. "We're not Jean and Susan. I don't wanna be. I like bein' us. I like the way things are. I'm..." She cleared her throat. "I'm attracted to you, Sharon, but that doesn't mean I've got any sort of idea or expectation about where to go from here. I guess what I'm sayin' is that we should just do what feels right for us. This friendship is my priority and I'm not about to do anythin' to jeopardize that."

Sharon nodded. "Neither am I. I can't allow that to happen."

Brenda's nostrils flared as she exhaled an uneven breath. "A little kissin' isn't the end of the world, Sharon. Pretendin' we're not attracted to each other has only made things worse."

Sharon couldn't deny that Brenda had a point-it was the avoidance of the attraction that had blown it out of proportion, though she couldn't picture the two of them chatting over coffee about their mutual interest in adding a physical dimension to their already intense friendship. No, the world hadn't ended by kissing Brenda for a third time, but things had irrevocably changed. Sharon longed for the ease of the early days of their relationship, a time when they'd been blissfully unaware of any feelings lurking in their collective unconscious. Those days, she regretfully admitted to herself, were over.

"You're right," Sharon finally said. "Perhaps we should try a new approach."

Brenda held her breath, her mind constructing a wonderful tableau of fused mouths and tangled limbs.

"I'm not saying that we should follow these impulses whenever they arise," Sharon carefully went on, her gaze direct, "but perhaps we should talk about them if they do."

Brenda nodded. "If this is what havin' a wife is like, I think I'll pass."

The brunette snorted and smiled, relieved that the tone had considerably lightened. "Perhaps we jumped a little too quickly into marriage."

"Agreed." The blonde pulled her hand back and slowly pulled off the little gold band. "With this ring, I thee un-wed." She set it in the palm of Sharon's hand. "And though I'll still love and honor you as my friend, I can't promise to obey."

Sharon chuckled and allowed Brenda to remove her own wedding ring. She had thought, for a brief moment, that she would feel naked without it, but it was a gratifying relief to let it go. "Mmm...let's leave married life for Suzie and Jean, shall we?"

"Are we okay?"

"Yes."

"Was there a 'for now' at the end of that 'yes'?"

Sharon rolled her eyes, closing her fist around the two wedding rings. "Don't push it or I'll make you sleep on the sofa tonight."


	17. Chapter 17

**Authors: i-must-go-first & UbiquitousMixie**

**Rating: PG-13 (Overall M)**

**Word Count: 7934**

**Disclaimer: Not ours. Please don't sue.**

**Summary: A late-night craving and a coincidental meeting lead a certain deputy chief to discover that there's much more to the inimitable Captain Raydor than meets the eye, and to realize that her mama was right: sometimes all a single woman really needs is a good girlfriend.**

**Authors' Note: Thanks to everyone for your continued support. In this chapter, sweater sets, pedicures, and home-cooked meals can only mean one thing: Mama's in town!**

**Chapter 17: The Women**

1.

She moved slowly, stealthily through the shadows, every line of her body flexing with supple, easy grace. Her keen sight penetrated the darkness, allowing her to keep her target in sight. She scented her opportunity, and knew it was finally coming, any second now, after seemingly endless waiting. No matter; she was good at waiting. She had learned how to be very, very patient when it was necessary.

She watched as the dark-haired woman moved around the kitchen, her movements also easy and graceful from long practice, efficient. Silverware rattled as she opened and closed a drawer. A single plate clinked on the counter. Finally, finally, she turned her back, her spine arching as she reached up high into a cabinet, and the moment had come.

The instinctive tensing of her muscles, followed by a quick, deft spring -

Sharon whirled, wineglass in hand, at the unmistakable sound. "Man_za_na!" she exclaimed. "_No!_ Bad kitty!"

The cat's good eye blinked balefully at her. The captain yanked the plate containing her steak salad from the counter top and nudged the cat to the floor with her elbow. "You've had your dinner," she continued, keeping a wary eye on the salad as she uncorked the pinot noir and poured herself a glass. The distinctive pattering cadence of Manzana's limping gait followed her into the living room, the feline parking herself statue-like beside Sharon's stocking-clad feet as Sharon relaxed into her habitual corner of the sofa. The human member of the duo lifted the remote control and turned on the television, sipping her wine as she scrolled through the contents of her DVR. She wanted something engaging enough to keep her entertained, but not terribly cerebral. It had been a long, tiring day at the end of a long week, and she just wanted to relax.

The captain rolled her head from side to side, wincing when her vertebrae cracked. It had been a blessedly quiet, routine week inside FID, filled with nothing more noteworthy than the usual reports, meetings, and a couple of court appearances. There had been no unexpected summons from Chief Pope, no grisly murders, no being driven into close quarters with and out of her mind by Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson. It had been peaceful, soothing; a reassuring return to the normality of her orderly routine.

It had been bloody boring.

It had also been entirely Brenda-free. Sharon wasn't delusional enough to pretend that the two were unrelated. Brenda brought unpredictability, laughter - fun. Being with the other woman had reawakened a part of Sharon that she'd almost forgotten existed, a spontaneous streak wider than most people would have expected.

She also brought complications.

Sharon sighed and picked up her knife and fork as the theme music for a hokey British detective series began to play. Manzana mewled pitifully, and Sharon made a mental note to ask Daniel if he'd been feeding her table scraps.

The captain appreciated that Brenda Leigh was giving her some breathing room. The way the blonde had looked at her after that very memorable kiss - Brenda had wanted to kiss her again; Sharon knew that. She would have, if the older woman had given her the slightest indication that the gesture would have been welcomed. Even now, sitting in the privacy of her living room, the memory made Sharon's pulse race. It also made her feel like she might vomit. She couldn't deny the rush of desire she felt in Brenda's presence; neither could she deny that it terrified her. She didn't know what to do about it, but did know that she couldn't wish it away, and wouldn't if she could. Thinking about it made her head spin the way it did when she forgot her reading glasses, but she had to think it through before she could figure out what to do, how to proceed without wrecking what had quickly become one of the most important relationships in her life. So she appreciated the reprieve, even if the coveted solitude stretching before her seemed a little _too_ uninterrupted.

When her cell phone rang, she was certain it would be Daniel. A glance at the screen provided confirmation, and Sharon told herself she was relieved, not disappointed.

"Hi, sweetheart."

"Hey, Mom. I just called to say hi, since we haven't talked in a few days. Did you -"

The rest of the sentence was impenetrably garbled by static. Sharon glanced down in time to see her signal strength drop to zero, and then the call dropped altogether.

She'd just pressed play, launching Inspector Barnaby and Sergeant Troy into action on screen, when the phone rang again. "Hey, baby," she answered brightly. "Let's try this again, shall we?"

After a pause, her caller responded, "Hey, Sharon. Are you busy?"

The brunette's cheeks were immediately suffused with heat. "Brenda - I thought you were Daniel."

"Yeah, I - I figured. _Are_ you busy? I could really use your help."

Sharon sat up a little straighter, immediately launching into Captain Raydor mode. Manzana craned her neck toward the steak and sniffed, her little pink nostrils flaring with hope. "Of course, Chief. Where's the scene?"

"No, there's no - I'm at home. It's my mama."

"What's happened?" Sharon sprang to her feet, dinner forgotten. Manzana could do her worst. "Is it an emergency?"

"Well, I guess you could say that." Brenda hesitated, and Sharon could just see her gnawing away on her lip. "She just called me. She's in a cab, on her way here from the airport."

Brenda was unwittingly biting on her fingernails when the buzzer sounded; with an annoyed groan she realized that she had chewed off the manicure she'd gotten only two days earlier. Her stomach twisted uncomfortably and she pressed the button to allow her visitor to enter the building. She tried not to pace and instead bit the inside of her cheek.

The near-immediate knock on her door made Brenda sigh with relief. "Thank the Lord you're as much of a homebody as I am!" she said, tugging Sharon into the apartment.

Sharon looked around the little apartment, searching for any sign that her friend's mother had arrived before her. "What exactly is going on? Did something happen at home?"

"No. Well, I don't think so. She said she wanted to surprise me with a visit."

"And this is a problem because...?" Sharon sat down on the red sofa and Sugar immediately lunged for her ankles, swatting playfully at the hem of her jeans.

"When she shows up outta the blue like this, there's always a reason." Brenda continued picking at her nails while she checked her phone to see how much time had elapsed since Willie Rae had called.

Sharon patiently watched the younger woman bristling with nervous energy and recalled the poised, wise presence that Willie Rae Johnson had exuded on the one occasion they had met. She had been, like any well-meaning mother, curious about Sharon and the friendship she shared with her daughter. On that miserable, lonely Christmas day, Willie Rae had been the most welcoming person of the group, making her feel as though she belonged in that ragtag, temporary family. They had cooked together, discussing embarrassing stories of Brenda Leigh's childhood, and they had discussed Sharon's children. Yes-Willie Rae was an impressively intense, self-aware woman, but Sharon had liked her. She had been the only person to lessen the ache of being away from her kids on Christmas Day.

"Could it be your father?" Sharon asked, her mind running the gamut of possible disasters that could have struck the Johnson family. "Has his cancer returned?"

"No. If he were sick, he would have come with her, or they'd have asked me to come home." She dropped onto the couch beside Sharon, scooping the cat into her arms. Sugar pressed her paw to Brenda's cheek and the blonde nuzzled her nose against the cat's face. With the impatience of all young felines, Sugar allowed herself to be cuddled for only a moment before she wiggled herself free from Brenda's grasp and leapt off the sofa. "But what if somethin's wrong?"

"Brenda," Sharon began tentatively, "is it possible that perhaps your mother simply wants to spend some time with you?"

Brenda groaned and dropped her head onto Sharon's shoulder. "There's a catch. There's always a catch."

"Why don't you wait and see what happens before you doom this visit with all of your negative thinking?" Sharon adamantly tried to ignore the way Brenda's hair smelled like vanilla. "I'm sure everything will be fine."

"Are you just sayin' that so I'll stop worryin'?"

"That depends," Sharon said, unable to resist stroking back the blonde curls from Brenda's face, "is it working?"

Brenda lifted her head and looked at her, piercing brown eyes scanning her face as if she hadn't already memorized its features. "Maybe a little..." She smiled and, as if it were inevitable, her gaze dropped to Sharon's lips.

Sharon's pulse quickened. She resisted the urge to lick her lips, knowing it would only be perceived as an invitation, and she wasn't entirely sure that it was an invitation she wished to extend. Only Brenda's lips were curved in a serene grin, and Sharon wondered if her mouth had always been so sensual and inviting. She licked her lips and held her breath.

The shrill sound of the buzzer echoed throughout the apartment. The noise drew on, as if Willie Rae were unsure of how long to hold the button and had decided that a full thirty seconds was adequate. Sharon immediately straightened her back and Brenda gave a frustrated sigh as she got to her feet to unlock the main door.

"I'm gonna go down to meet her and help her with her bags. Will you keep an eye on Sugar for me and let us in when we get up here?"

"Of course."

When Sharon was alone, she closed her eyes impatiently and scolded herself. What kind of person was she to be thinking about kissing Brenda Leigh when her mother was right outside? And yet, despite the firm talking-to's she'd given herself about reinforcing the platonic side of their friendship, Sharon had wanted to kiss her. Badly. She had wanted to feel the slow, wet slide of Brenda's tongue against her own.

Arousal curled low in her belly. When she heard voices in the hall, she rubbed at the tense muscles of her neck. She checked to make sure that Sugar was keeping herself busy in the kitchen with a crumpled up piece of paper and then she opened her door to greet her best friend's mother.

"Mrs. Johnson," Sharon said with that practiced, poised smile that made Brenda think she would've been an excellent spokesmodel. Toothpaste, hand lotion, wooden nickels - if Sharon was selling, Brenda figured people would buy. "How nice to see you." She stepped aside so the diminutive woman could enter the apartment, looking beyond her to a red-faced Brenda struggling up the last steps with her mother's luggage. "Oh, my. That is a large suitcase."

"I already told Brenda Leigh not to worry, dear. I'm not movin' in; I just brought her a few things for her new apartment. And call me _Willie Rae_, Sharon." She enthusiastically gripped Sharon's elbows and gave them a little shake, as if they were already old friends. "I'm so glad to see you again, here keepin' my daughter company."

Sharon's cheeks felt hot, and she knew her eyes were a little too bright as she smiled back, assaulted by images of just how she might have been keeping the woman's precious only daughter company right that very minute had Willie Rae's timing been better. Or worse; surely she meant worse.

The brunette darted a furtive glance at Brenda's mouth. No, she'd definitely meant better.

This was ridiculous, the captain scolded herself with a firm shake of her head. She couldn't just go around kissing her best friend! And she couldn't dwell on the thought of it while she was attempting to help entertain said best friend's sweet, elderly, Southern, no-doubt-right-wing mother.

Willie Rae was turning in a circle, a delighted smile on her comfortably lined face. "Why, Brenda Leigh! This place is just darlin'. And so bright and cheerful -"

Brenda smiled, pleased by the approbation. "Sharon helped me pick the colors," she proclaimed proudly. "Come on, I'll show you the rest, and we can put your suitcase in the bedroom."

"Mrs. - _Willie Rae_, have you eaten?"

When she answered that she hadn't, Brenda chimed in, "You must be tired after your flight. We can order in. Come on, Mama."

As Brenda showed off her abode, Sharon went into the kitchen and began a brisk survey. By the time Brenda and Willie Rae returned, she was defrosting a bag of frozen shrimp and chopping an onion.

"Oh, Sharon, you don't have to do that," Brenda fussed, watching intently.

"You can't feed your mother an exclusive diet of Chinese take-out, Brenda." She looked up from her chopping with a one-sided smirk. "Besides, I'm starving."

"Can I help?"

"You can put water on to boil for pasta, and then go visit with your mother."

Brenda bent and rummaged through the cabinet that housed the large saucepan, managing to make an inordinate amount of noise in the process. "I'm gonna have plenty of time to visit with my mother," she muttered. "She's stayin' a week."

"Yes, you do have plenty of time," Sharon agreed pleasantly. "Starting now." She made a little shooing motion. "Go on."

"Be careful with that knife," Brenda cautioned, earning herself a fierce glare.

The two Johnson women were cooing over Sugar's antics in identical tones of besotted adoration when Sharon peeked out of the kitchen twenty minutes later. "Dinner's ready, ladies."

"Oh, thank goodness." Brenda sprang to her feet with a quick, eager smile. "I've had the hardest time keepin' Mama out of the kitchen. I don't think she would've lasted another ten minutes."

"It just doesn't seem right to let your guest do the cookin'," Willie Rae returned in a tone of mild disapproval as they all moved toward the dining table.

"You're a guest," the blonde pointed out to her mother, her eyes meeting Sharon's. "I did offer to help."

The warmth in those soft green eyes soothed Brenda's mildly ruffled feathers, reassuring her that she and Sharon understood one another and her friend didn't fault her for her lack of skills in the culinary department. "It's just pasta, nothing fancy," Sharon interjected mildly, pulling her chair up to the table. "And no trouble at all."

"We'll go out somewhere nice tomorrow night," Brenda said. She smoothed her napkin over her lap. "You too, Sharon."

"I wouldn't want to intrude," Sharon murmured rather awkwardly.

"It wouldn't be an intrusion at all, dear," Willie Rae insisted as she served herself, her quick, light movements making Sharon think of a bird - something light and sleek and colorful, in a summer garden. "It would be a pleasure. I haven't really gotten to know any of Brenda's friends since she was in high school. But if you have plans -"

"Of course she doesn't," Brenda interrupted grumpily, with a distinctly proprietary air.

Sharon raised her eyebrows. "I could have plans," she countered.

Brown eyes widened. "But you don't, do you?"

The captain's answering smile was rueful. "No, of course not. I'd love to join you."

"Invite Daniel," Brenda chimed in recklessly, and looked to Willie Rae. "Sharon's son. He's in medical school," she explained. "You'll like him."

"I'm sure I will, sweetheart, but I know who Daniel is. Sharon and I got to have a nice long talk when she helped me with the dinner last Christmas," Willie Rae reminded, and Sharon was gratified to see Brenda pale slightly, no doubt wondering what mortifying anecdotes her mother might have shared with the other woman. The captain smiled slightly and Willie Rae's warm gaze settled on her. "Now, how are _both_ of your children, Sharon?"

Sharon's stomach clenched, but she merely looked down at her plate for a second. When she looked back up, she met Brenda's stricken stare.

Willie Rae frowned, her pride at having remembered that there were two Raydor offspring quickly replaced by concerned confusion.

"Mama-" Brenda began, but Sharon gently cleared her throat.

"It's all right, Brenda." It never got any easier telling people that her daughter was dead, and this occasion was no different. Despite the hollow-sounding words and the bitter taste they left in her mouth once they had been spoken, Sharon knew that she could not defer to her friend whenever the question arose. "My daughter passed away."

"Oh." Willie Rae's slender hand clutched her throat, and Sharon could tell by the ashen hue of the older woman's cheeks that she was imagining the pain a mother must feel at the loss of her child. "Oh Sharon, I'm so sorry. That must've been just horrible for you and your family."

"It was." She looked away, uncomfortable at the twin pairs of pitying glances from the Johnson women, and rose gracefully to her feet. "What can I get you to drink, Willie Rae?"

"You don't have to wait on me!" Willie Rae swatted at Brenda's arm, tactfully taking Sharon's cue to change the subject. "Brenda Leigh, don't be rude! Sharon here cooked us a lovely dinner-don't make her serve the drinks too."

"Oww," Brenda whined, ruefully rubbing her forearm. "Sit, Sharon. I'll get it. What would you like? I've got a pitcher of tea in the fridge."

"That would be just fine," Willie Rae replied, and Sharon nodded in agreement. She sat dutifully by her plate, waiting for Brenda to return before she began to eat. "Sharon, Brenda Leigh was tellin' me all about the case you helped her solve.

The brunette resisted raising an eyebrow, wondering which details the blonde had squeamishly omitted. She doubted, for instance, that Brenda mentioned the part where they made out in the bedroom they shared. She smirked. "Actually, Willie Rae, Brenda spent most of her time in the pool while I did all of the grunt work."

"Hey!" Brenda shrieked. "It was a _team_ effort...and don't you forget that I saved your life!" She set down two glasses of iced tea and went back for the third.

"I was the lucky one on the ground floor when our friendly neighborhood sociopath paid us a visit," Sharon explained, grinning at the sight of Willie Rae's captivated expression. "Your daughter was kind enough to stop her before she did any real damage."

"To think they had you both sittin' around, waitin' for a killer to show up!" Willie Rae exclaimed, blanching slightly at the image. "As if you were human bait! I can't believe the LAPD would put you in that position!"

Brenda caught Sharon's eye, and she knew better than to explain that it had, in fact, been Brenda's idea. "Dangers aside, I think we managed okay. Besides, it was nice to work with Brenda and be on the same team for once."

The blonde nearly choked on her shrimp. She coughed, cheeks growing pink, and then smiled awkwardly at her mother's concerned stare. "Sorry. Shar, this is so yummy. You'll have to teach me how to make it sometime."

Willie Rae furrowed her brow and frowned disapprovingly. "I should think Sharon wouldn't want anythin' to do with teachin' you to cook after that accident you two had!"

Sharon laughed. "It was my own fault."

Brenda grimaced. "I still feel so bad about that. You've got that nasty scar on your hand to mark the occasion."

Sharon looked down at the scar in question. "It's not like anyone's staring at my hands, Brenda."

Brenda's cheeks remained flushed as she attacked her pasta with fervor.

"Well, it sure is nice to know that Brenda's got a friend out here," Willie Rae added, oblivious to her daughter's reddened face. "I was so worried about her after the..." she lowered her voice "..._the divorce_ and all."

"I've been fine, Mama. I've got my friend and my cat. What more does a single girl need?"

"At your age?" Willie Rae asked, pointing her fork at her daughter. "Companionship. A nice, well-mannered man to spend your life with."

"Oh, Mama," Brenda moaned, drawing the syllables out and sounding for all the world like a put-upon teenager. "Please don't start that. I've already been divorced twice. I'd think you and Daddy would be about ready for me to hang up my datin' hat for good."

Sharon smirked into her tea glass as she realized Willie Rae was poised to launch into essentially the same speech she got from Daniel on a regular basis. On second thought, maybe it wasn't such a good idea to introduce her son to Brenda Leigh's mother.

"Don't you agree, now, Sharon?"

Sharon's attention was yanked back to the present by the older woman's question, and she found the eyes of the two Johnson women fixed attentively on her. "Ah -"

Brenda's expression plainly telegraphed that whatever Willie Rae had said, Sharon's life wouldn't be safe if she agreed.

"It would be a cryin' shame for Brenda resign herself to spendin' the rest of her life alone. Sometimes a woman just needs the companionship of a good man. There are some things in life you aren't meant to do by yourself."

The captain hoped she didn't look as shell-shocked as she felt. Had Willie Rae Johnson just made an oblique reference to sexual satisfaction? _You don't need a man for that, honey_, Sharon thought before she could stop herself, and then felt her face flame. No. Brenda's mother had probably just meant you needed a man around to fix the faucet when it leaked and program the VCR. Brenda was her mother's daughter, after all.

Remembering their conversation about VCRs and vibrators, Sharon tittered. Brenda looked at her like she'd clearly lost her mind, and then the blonde's eyes widened in horror, and she blushed too. She was remembering Sharon's threat to tattle to Willie Rae.

Unfortunately, the deputy chief was completely safe on that front, which she ought to know. If Sharon brought up the notorious Rabbit, Brenda Leigh now had plenty of material to retaliate. _Oh, Mama, did I tell you about the time Sharon stuck her tongue down my throat? _

More awkward than she had felt any time in recent memory, Sharon sat frozen to her chair, fork poised in midair, unable to think of a single thing to say.

"Don't ask Sharon, Mama," Brenda piped up cheerily. "She doesn't date."

_That's right_, the dark-haired woman reminded herself. _I don't date, and there are reasons for that_.

Fortunately, before the two Johnsons could begin dissecting all the gory details of her nonexistent love life, Sharon's phone rang. She excused herself in a flash and fumbled to extract it from her handbag. She glanced at the screen, hesitated for a split second, and then brusquely answered, "Raydor."

"Ooh, the captain is in. You're not back at work, are you, Mom?"

"All right, I'm on my way," Sharon said, rising from her seat and shooting her dinner companions a quick, apologetic glance.

"Mom, what's going on? Are you drunk?"

"Just text me the address. How many shots fired?"

"Oh-_ho_. You owe me big time. I may not have a clue what you're up to, but that doesn't mean I don't fully intend to collect. You remember those sunglasses you insisted were obscenely expensive?"

"I see. Thank you, officer."

Daniel snickered. "You're such a wimp, Mom. G'night."

Sharon slipped her phone back into the side pocket of her bag, but before she could even utter a word of apology, Willie Rae was waving her off. "That's all right, dear. I know how it is: duty calls. We'll see you tomorrow, though."

"I'll call you," Brenda promised, following her to the door.

The captain fluttered her fingers at both of them in a little wave. She only felt a tiny bit guilty. "See you tomorrow," she offered insouciantly, "unless I get all wrapped up in this case." She pursed her lips regretfully, suggesting that her phantom case promised to be a complicated one and it was all too likely that she'd spend her weekend slaving away.

The blonde leaned in the doorway, pouting. The expression did absurd things to her mouth, and Sharon forced herself to look away. "I wish you didn't have to go."

Just like that, those icy-hot tingles were back again, starting at the back of her neck and on the soles of her feet and working their way to meet in the middle. She suddenly felt like a teenager after a first date, standing hesitantly on someone's front porch in the glaring puddle cast by the inevitable outdoor light. Instead of an anxious father glaring through the curtains, there was Willie Rae at the table, smiling benevolently; but the effect was the same. No matter how dangerously tempting the prospect, there was no power in heaven or on earth that would make Sharon even consider kissing Brenda Leigh good night. It wasn't even an option.

Distinctly relieved and feeling suddenly lighter, she managed a weak smile. "You know how it is," she said. "Night, Brenda. Enjoy the rest of your evening."

As Sharon crossed the courtyard, she heard Brenda's door close, and realized that she was already breathing easier, tension ebbing from her tight shoulders. That had gone well enough, she reassured herself. Thanks to Willie Rae's presence, nothing the slightest bit inappropriate had happened tonight.

As she slid behind the wheel of her car, Sharon Raydor decided that, no matter how Brenda Leigh might feel about it, for her part she was very glad Willie Rae had come to visit.

2.

While sitting in the backseat of Brenda's car that was headed in the direction of the nearest shopping mall, Sharon decided that she was not, in fact, glad that Willie Rae had visited. What she had hoped would be a quiet morning of yoga, CNN, and lounging with her cat had gone up in smoke as soon as she received Brenda's call. The blonde had locked herself in the bathroom, muffling the sound of her voice with the spray of the shower, and had chastised Sharon for using a made-up crime scene as an excuse to leave. When Sharon had feigned ignorance, Brenda coolly informed her that, while she had been unable to check up on her husband's fake cases that fell under the purview of the FBI, she _could_ check up on Sharon's. The tone of her voice implied that Sharon would indeed be spending the day traipsing around Macy's with the deputy chief and her mother, _or else_.

Sharon wasn't particularly keen on finding out just what "or else" entailed.

The fact of the matter was that Sharon simply wanted to stay far, far away from situations that included Brenda removing articles of clothing. Except, of course, for the fact that she didn't want to avoid them at all. She vividly remembered Brenda's tiny black bikini and shuddered.

"Brenda Leigh, turn down the air conditionin'. Sharon's practically shiverin' back there," Willie Rae implored, giving the captain a sympathetic look. Sharon smiled politely and screamed internally.

"I can't remember the last time Brenda Leigh took me shoppin'," Willie Rae said, punctuating her remark with an excited wiggle. "It's been so long since we had a girls' day out, hasn't it?"

"Yes, it has, Mama," Brenda agreed, her eyes flicking up to catch Sharon's in the rear-view mirror.

"And I'm so glad that you were able to come along," the older woman continued, turning back to smile warmly at Sharon. "Isn't it lucky that you were able to wrap up your case so quickly? Why-you should teach Brenda Leigh a thing or two about that. I swear, this girl takes _days_ on her work. We hardly ever see her when we visit!"

"It _is_ just so lucky," Brenda echoed, gripping the steering wheel a little tighter.

Sharon smirked at the blonde's evident annoyance, her guilt absolved as soon as she realized that she had played the work card just as Brenda had time and time again. "I'd love to get my hands on Major Crimes," she teased. "They'd certainly benefit from a lesson or two in efficiency and time management."

Brenda snorted. "And have you standin' in my murder room with your little watch? Nooo, thank you. We do just fine on our own." She navigated the car into the busy parking lot and found a spot not too far from the entrance.

"Well, thank the Lord the two of you managed to get the mornin' off." Willie Rae unbuckled her seatbelt and got out of the car. Her bright red vest, which displayed a vibrant array of cross-stitched birds, gleamed brightly in the sunlight. "The pair of you really need a heavy dose of retail therapy."

Sharon raised an eyebrow at Brenda, who gaped. "What do you mean?"

"Brenda Leigh, I bought you that skirt five years ago. You need to spruce up your wardrobe, especially if you're gonna catch the eye of a good man."

Sharon snorted as the trio made their way toward Macy's, unable to bite back her laughter. "I've been itching to take her shopping for ages, Willie Rae."

"You could use a few new items yourself," the older woman added, wiping the smirk from Sharon's face. Brenda practically hooted with giggles. "Everythin' I've ever seen you wear is black or gray or navy. A pretty girl like you needs a little color."

"Don't worry, Mama," Brenda replied, eyes gleaming. "We'll find her somethin' nice and pink."

The glare Sharon sent Brenda's way was murderous. The blonde merely smirked malevolently in return.

No. Sharon was _not_ glad that Willie Rae had come to town.

"Mama, I'm never gonna wear this dress," Brenda whined, holding out a hideous frock that had more flowers and bows than her childhood Sunday school dresses. Sharon would mock her into eternity if she so much as tried it on. Before her mother could protest, she set it back on the rack. "Let's keep lookin'. Why don't we find somethin' nice for you to wear when you go home?"

"A goin' away outfit, Brenda Leigh? Already?" Her mother raised an eyebrow.

"I was thinkin' along the lines of somethin' pretty for you to wear for Daddy when he picks you up from the airport," she amended, her eyes casually scanning the Women's department for sign of her elusive friend. "Don't you think he'd like that?"

"After all these years, Brenda Leigh, your father is happy to see me in whatever I'm wearin'. I don't need to impress him. You, on the other hand..."

Brenda scowled and rolled her eyes, spying the captain beside a display of cardigans. Willie Rae looked in the same direction and her eyes lit up. "Oh look, twin sets in every color of the rainbow!" she exclaimed, hastening over to join the dark-haired woman. "You just wouldn't believe how hard these are to come by in Atlanta. The selection's always picked over, but here, it looks like they've got just everything." Sharon smiled tolerantly, the tolerance turning into a deadly smirk when the silver-haired woman continued, "Brenda Leigh, do you need any new ones? It looked to me like your yellow one's startin' to ball up. And look at these adorable little pearl buttons."

The chief looked down at her mother's frail but capable hands playing among the folded garments, and Sharon knew her friend was tempted, but didn't want to risk a display of enthusiasm in front of her. "No, Mama, I think I'm good."

"How 'bout you, Sharon?" Willie Rae held a pale pink sweater up next to the captain's cheek, and Brenda watched her friend's green eyes turn glassy.

"That's really not my color," she managed.

"You should branch out, honey. Take a chance! Look at all these beautiful colors. Now, what on earth a pretty girl like you is doin' in all those drab grays -" Willie Rae gestured toward Sharon, who smiled tightly, her eyes meeting Brenda's. Brown eyes flashed back the younger woman's sympathy. In her black jeans and boots and a slinky gray sweater that had probably cost at least a week's pay, Sharon looked effortlessly elegant, perfect for Los Angeles; but she clearly fell short of Willie Rae's standards.

"Those buttons," Sharon tried again, tentatively, thinking she should be applauded for managing not to grimace.

"Mama, that's not Sharon at all," Brenda decreed, swooping down to rescue the captain and tucking her mother's hand through the crook of her elbow. "We'll find her somethin' bright and colorful that she'll actually wear, I promise." The blonde patted her mother's hand, but it was Sharon's gaze she met with an ominous twinkle of mischief as she added, "You just wait and see."

When Sharon realized Brenda's strategy was to distract her mother from her mission to revolutionize the wardrobes of her daughter and her daughter's best friend, she eagerly jumped on board. As much as Sharon herself would've loved to see some alterations in Brenda Leigh's clothing choices, she wasn't willing to risk getting stuck with a complete Liz Claiborne suit and fake pearls; some prices were just too high to pay, even for friendship. They'd managed to tempt the older woman with a pale pink suit that, even Sharon had to admit, set off her delicate complexion and her twinkling eyes, because, as the captain had pointed out when Willie Rae had again trotted out her line about not needing to impress Clay, "But isn't it nice to be able to once in a while anyway?"

Poor Sharon, Brenda would think later, feeling mildly apologetic. She hadn't even seen it coming. One minute she'd been standing there listening to Brenda's mother extol the virtues of synthetic fabrics ("They just never wrinkle, and you can wash them out in the sink and have 'em dry in a jiffy!"), and the next Willie Rae had shanghaied her into a dressing room with a hideous fuchsia sweater dress.

Smiling that same self-satisfied smile that Brenda remembered seeing grace her lips every summer when her mama won the strawberry-pie-baking contest at the First Methodist, Willie Rae patted Brenda's hand. "Now, you stay right here, and don't let her take it off until I see," she instructed, indicating the area where they stood right outside the door of the dressing room Sharon occupied. "I'm gonna gather up a few more things that caught my eye."

After a moment the blonde heard an unmistakable hiss: "Brendaaa!"

She swallowed a laugh. "It's okay, Sharon, she's gone."

"Brenda, this dress is made from substances that do not occur in nature," Sharon continued, her clipped words agonized.

"You don't have to buy it; just twirl for Mama and she'll be happy," Brenda soothed. "Trust me, this day is my entire childhood and adolescence." Maybe, she thought with faint hope, after this little outing Sharon would have a smidge more respect for her friend's sense of personal style, given this insight into her disadvantaged upbringing.

"It has _appliques_!" Sharon wailed, sounding as if she were smothering, and Brenda just managed to turn her hysterical laughter into a cough when her mother reappeared.

"Do you have it on, dear? Let me see."

Several seconds of silence followed. "I'd rather not," Sharon finally responded in her cool Captain Raydor tone.

It worked on legions of police officers and perps, but it didn't faze Brenda's mother. "Come on, now. Open that door and don't be silly."

Brenda distinctly heard a sigh before the door opened just enough to reveal her friend, whose lovely curves had been swallowed by a hideous pinkish-purple shroud. It was so bad that, after a couple of seconds of stunned silence, Brenda couldn't hold back her giggles. "Oh, Lord, Sharon -"

The brunette pressed her lips very firmly together. "I know," she said flatly. "I _told_ you. I look like I've been attacked by The Blob."

Willie Rae looked alarmed. "Maybe in another size," she suggested doubtfully, and was answered by the quick shutting of the dressing room door as Sharon stepped back inside.

"No!" the two younger women exclaimed in unison.

As Brenda wiped tears of laughter from her eyes, she took in her mother's crestfallen countenance and made a split-second decision. "Don't go anywhere, Shar," she called. "We'll be back in a tick." She grabbed Willie Rae's hand and led her back out onto the sales floor.

Despite the glare of the hideously unflattering overhead fluorescent lights, ubiquitous in dressing rooms, Sharon had begun to shiver and was extremely tired of standing around in her socks and underwear when her friend's voice rang out: "Knock knock!"

"I'm not dressed," the captain replied, resigned to her fate. "Whatever it is, just pass it over the top."

"No, you're gonna like these," Brenda returned confidently, stretching up on tiptoe to hand over several hangers. "And you have to let us see."

"You too, Brenda Leigh. This'll be just darlin' on you," Sharon heard vaguely from outside as she contemplated the garments Brenda had handed her. No fake pearls, no appliques, no sequins, and nary a Liz label in sight - but certainly nothing she would ever pick out for herself.

The blonde was saying something about there not being any free dressing rooms. Skeptically eyeing a vee-neck sweater in deep rose, Sharon heard Willie Rae respond, but all she clearly made out was her own name.

"Try on the sweater first," Brenda called, and with a roll of her eyes, Sharon resolved to get this over with as quickly as possible. She yanked her jeans back on, double-checked that her bra was properly adjusted, and stripped the sweater from the hanger. It was a damn sight better than that awful dress, but it was still _pink_, Sharon thought, and then hesitated as she glimpsed her own reflection. The material hugged her curves, the neckline plunging more daringly than anything she'd wear to work. It sort of looked... not terrible.

When she opened the door, Willie Rae beamed, and Brenda clasped her hands in front of her chest. "I knew that would look great on you," Brenda declared happily. "That rose color, with your beautiful brown hair -"

She should have known. Sharon's eyebrows crept toward her hairline. "You picked this out?"

"I helped," Brenda responded in a tone that plainly telegraphed that yes, she'd picked it out. "You're buyin' that, captain, and that is a direct order. Now the dress."

"Do you think my clothes are boring?" Sharon heard herself ask, thinking of the night they'd gone out dancing with Morales, and feeling a ridiculous twinge of hurt.

"I think your clothes are beautiful." Brenda's eyes seemed to caress Sharon, lingering on her prominently-displayed chest, and the captain hoped that neither of the Johnsons had noticed her quickly indrawn breath. Brenda Leigh had intentionally selected a sweater that would show off her breasts? Well, well. That put a different complexion on things. Maybe she'd be taking this sweater home with her after all. "But it'd be nice to see you in bright colors sometimes. Now try the dress."

"Did you choose it too?" Sharon asked in a low tone, her pulse still not recovered from the way Brenda had looked at her.

Those brown eyes were soft as they sparkled back at her. "I told you, I helped," she replied in the same low tone.

"You go on in there with her, honey; it'll save time. That line's a mile long." Willie Rae's voice made Sharon jump - for a few seconds she'd all but forgotten the elderly woman was there. Brenda's mother shoved a long dress at Brenda and then shoved Brenda at Sharon. "There's plenty of space."

"Mama, Sharon might not want to share," Brenda protested, turning to look over her shoulder at Willie Rae. The captain realized that was what she'd heard Mrs. Johnson say a moment before: not _Sharon_, but "_You can just share_."

"Don't be silly. Sharon's had two children; I'm sure she's not a prude. Besides, neither of you has got anything the other one hasn't got," Willie Rae retorted, giggling at her mild version of ribaldry. Then, having heard enough excuses, she efficiently closed the cubicle door in her daughter's face.

Brenda stared at the door for a few counts, and then slowly turned around to face the other woman. "Mama's right," she said, striving for normality. "There's no reason to be silly." But she heard the high, nervous tremor in her voice, and she knew Sharon heard it too.

Unsurprisingly, the captain decided to brazen it out. "Right," she agreed. "Did they still have co-ed locker rooms when you went through the academy?" As she spoke, Sharon turned her back and smoothly whipped the sweater over her head. Brenda stared unabashedly at the creamy skin of her back, the curve of her spine against the stark contrast of her black bra.

The blonde didn't realize that she was staring until Sharon's arm reached in front of her to drape the sweater back on its hanger. She blinked, heat rising in her cheeks as she found herself with an eyeful of Sharon's breasts. She caught her own gaping reflection in the mirror and the sight of her desire-laden eyes was enough motivation to turn around. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest, beating so rapidly that Brenda wondered if Sharon might actually be able to hear it. With trembling fingers she worked the buttons of her pale orange cardigan through their holes, shrugging it off her shoulders before setting it down on the bench.

_Don't turn around_, Brenda told herself. She pulled her white tank top over her head, piling it on top of her sweater. As she reached for the zipper of her flowery skirt, Sharon's hip nudged her own. Despite the warning voice in her head, Brenda looked over her shoulder. The brunette was shimmying her jeans back down her legs, her backside covered in a set of low-rise black panties. When Sharon straightened her back, she cast a glance over her shoulder.

Their eyes met. Lips parted in a simultaneous acknowledgment: _we are in a small, enclosed space, we are half-naked, and Willie Rae is just outside. _

Still, Brenda let out a shaky breath as she turned around, her fingers deftly unzipping her skirt before she let it pool around her feet. She had no way of knowing if the other woman was still looking and hoped that she was.

"C'mon, you two," Willie Rae impatiently called from outside the dressing room. "I'm on pins and needles out here!"

"This dressin' room's a little smaller than I thought," Brenda mentioned for lack of better things to say as she gathered the fabric of the dress in her hands. The unzipped top of the dress fell forward, allowing her to step inside and pull it up around her waist. Behind her, she heard Sharon adjusting her own dress in a rustle of fabric.

"Are you claustrophobic, Brenda Leigh?" Sharon asked, turning around to raise a curious eyebrow at the blonde.

Brenda looked back over her shoulder. "No. Just...aware." She licked her lips, her eyes darting from the alluring shape of Sharon's mouth to the inviting display of cleavage. "Can, um, you zip me up?"

Sharon observed her for a long moment, her eyes dark and filled with something urgent, before she reached forward and brushed Brenda's hair to the side. She took a step forward, her breath warm on Brenda's back, as she peered down at the spattering of freckles on the blonde's pale shoulders. There were goosebumps on her skin and as Sharon slowly worked the zipper up her spine, she allowed her knuckles to graze against her flesh. Brenda shivered violently, her breath coming in heavy gasps. When Sharon's hands reached the nape of her neck Brenda spun around.

The captain nearly groaned at the unbearably tortured expression on Brenda's face. She could see it in her eyes, in the way her lips parted, that Brenda wanted to kiss her. No-Brenda _would_ kiss her and Sharon was going to let her.

A sharp knock on the door forced them to jump apart. Releasing the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, Sharon quickly unlocked the door and looked upon the elder woman with an expression that rivaled that of a deer in the headlights.

"Oh don't you two look just beautiful!" Willie Rae exclaimed, grabbing their hands as she drew them out of the dressing room. No longer distracted by close quarters, Sharon allowed herself to look at what Brenda was wearing. The dress was a deep eggplant color and clung to Brenda's slender body as if it had been painted on. It reminded Sharon of the blue dress that Brenda owned, slinking against her curves. Sharon loved purple and, she realized, she loved the way the younger woman looked in it, her creamy pale skin nearly glowing against the vibrant tone.

Brenda, for her part, was distracted by the dress she had chosen for Sharon. It was an olive green wrap, the color enhancing the emerald of her eyes. She bit her lip, proud of her success in selecting a garment that flattered every aspect of her friend's body. She would buy it for Sharon herself if the captain refused.

"You look lovely," Sharon said lamely. She schooled her expression, forcing herself to look away from the shape of Brenda's hips.

"Sharon's right." Willie Rae directed Brenda to stand right in front of the mirror, turning her daughter's body as if she were a doll. "This color's a little dark though, don't you think?"

"No," Brenda answered at once. "I love this color." In the mirror, her eyes found Sharon's.

"If you insist." Willie Rae heaved the burdensome sigh of a mother dealing with her impertinent child. "I hope you'll get that dress, Sharon. We saw that one and just knew you'd love it."

"I...might. It's a very nice dress."

"You _will_ and that's all there is to it," Brenda declared. "Let's hurry up and change...there's a Cinnabon outside callin' my name."

"I thought you were cuttin' down on sugar?" Willie Rae raised a disapproving eyebrow.

Brenda lied, "I'm always cuttin' down." She swept back into the dressing room, Sharon following closely behind.

When the door was locked and Brenda's dress unzipped, Sharon turned away and stared intently at the wall. "You need to stop looking at me like that," she whispered, pulling her dress over her head.

"Huh?" Brenda spun around, the top of her dress draping loosely over her torso.

Sharon felt the other woman's movement, felt those eyes again boring into her bare back, and refused to turn. She removed her own sweater from its peg on the wall and pulled it over her head, her movements measured. _Like I'm your damned Cinnabon_, she thought. _Like I'm your damned sickly sweet, double-chocolate, chocolate-dipped dessert with an extra side of chocolate sauce_. She huffed out a quick breath. "We've already had this conversation," she said instead. "There's no reason to have it again, especially not with your mother three feet away."

Wisely, Brenda Leigh said nothing; and after changing back into her jeans and slipping her boots on, Sharon tossed both the rose-colored sweater and the green dress across the dressing room's single stool. She certainly had no reason to purchase either.


End file.
